


The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows

by bearonthecouch



Series: Compass Series [3]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: F/M, Friendship/Love, Grief/Mourning, Growing Up, Mage-Templar Dynamics (Dragon Age), Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-21 04:47:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 26,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30016365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bearonthecouch/pseuds/bearonthecouch
Summary: “I didn't do it,” he insists, in a raw whimpering mewl that is enough to tear Rhyanon's heart out. “Rhyanon, please. You have to believe me.”She wants to. Maker, she wants to. It would make this so much easier.
Relationships: Female Amell/Anders (Dragon Age)
Series: Compass Series [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2212782





	1. Chapter 1

_Reports of lover's tryst were neither clear nor descript  
We kept it safe and slow  
The quiet things that no one ever knows  
\- _Brand New

Anders stares at her with hollow eyes, his hands clenched into tight fists. Rhyanon finds herself staring at his chest, which rises and falls in ragged patterns. Anything to keep from looking at the circle of bodies surrounding him.

“I didn't do it,” he insists, in a raw whimpering mewl that is enough to tear Rhyanon's heart out. “Rhyanon, please. You have to believe me.”

She wants to. _Maker_ , she wants to. It would make this so much easier. But she shakes her head, because she can't pretend there aren't a handful of dead templars there on the ground. Their armor is still shiny, beneath the dirt and blood. It smells like ozone. Like lyrium. Like magic. She can feel the residue of it in the air, and if she weren't here looking at the evidence, she'd have no idea Anders was strong enough to get off a shot like this. She's the war mage, not him. He has always been a healer.

“I don't care, Anders. It doesn't matter.” She reaches out for his hand, waiting for him to reach back. He doesn't, but when her fingers twine with his, he doesn't resist either. His skin feels clammy and cold. “Come on. Let's get you somewhere safe, okay?”

“I didn't do it,” he repeats, as he follows her with heavy footsteps up the narrow back passageways of Vigil's Keep.

“I know,” Rhyanon insists. “Anders, I swear it doesn't matter. You're safe here.” She pushes open a heavy wooden door that leads to an old library. As far as she knows, none of the darkspawn assaulting the Keep have made it this far. “Sit down,” she orders, and to her utter shock, Anders obeys instantly. It sets alarm bells ringing in her head, but she doesn't have the time to deal with them now. Honestly, his compliance will make things easier. If she can trust it to last. “Stay here. I'll be back as soon as I can.” Anders says nothing; he barely seems to move. Rhyanon takes a deep breath and holds it until it starts to hurt, deep in her chest. She somehow manages to keep from looking over her shoulder as she makes her way back down the spiraling staircase to the ground floor of the Keep. Her head rings with the heavy pressure that she's learned to associate with the presence of nearby darkspawn. She draws her sword, taking comfort in the feel of the steel in her hand. Loud shouts and the sounds of battle propel her forward. She'd come here expecting dozens of Grey Wardens and found little more than a meager handful. But even a handful can hold its own, in desperate times.

“Rhyanon!” a deep booming voice calls. “Watch out!”

She barely ducks in time to get out from under the arcing swing of a huge battle axe, wielded in the meaty hands of an ogre. Before she has time to think, she's reacting. She pushes out with her left hand, into which a ball of flame suddenly coalesces. The ball goes flying forward at her mental command, and it crashes into the ogre, who roars a high-pitched howl of pain. He lumbers forward toward Rhyanon, intent on getting revenge. This time, Rhyanon lashes out with her sword. The steel bites into the darkspawn's unprotected flesh, drawing thick black blood in its wake. The ogre has a longer reach than Rhyanon does, though, and the axe he carries hacks into her armor. Rhyanon clenches her teeth against the pain, and the momentum of the blow nearly sends her sprawling. She manages to catch herself on one knee and right herself before the axe swings down again, and she parries the incoming attack as well as she can with her sword. She manages to drive the axe away from her, at least for long enough to get a breath. From behind the ogre, the ally who had called out the warning earlier steps in to help – in the form of neatly decapitating the darkspawn with an axe of his own.

Rhyanon grins. “Thanks, Oghren.”

The dwarf grunts, then shakes his head in amazement. “They sure do make a mess of things, these darkspawn.”

“How many are left?”

Oghren shrugs. “Not near as many as their used to be; still too many to count.”

“Fair enough. I suppose we'd best get on with it, then.”

“The Wardens – what few of us there are – are still massing up in the courtyard. Seems to be where the thick of the action is.”

Rhyanon nods acknowledgment and starts heading in that direction.

To her very great surprise, the battle seems to be progressing well even without her. As she strides into the open space, sword in hand, none of the nearby darkspawn approach. As she looks around for one close enough to her position to enter combat with, she realizes there aren't any. There are a few darkspawn being easily mopped up by her fellow Wardens, but within minutes, they are all in pieces on the ground.

The dark-haired guardswoman who had met Rhyanon on the road from Amaranthine grins at her and offers something like a salute. In response, Rhyanon crosses her arms over her chest and nods. Despite living through the Blight, she does not yet feel used to commanding other soldiers. “What's the status?” she asks carefully.

“I think we've stemmed this particular invasion. There could always be more darkspawn coming up from below. Or from elsewhere. You know how they are.”

“We'll look for potential entry points as soon as possible,” Rhyanon agrees. “And we'll need to get you and the other recruits made official.”

The woman – Mhairi – looks up with wild-eyed excitement at that, and Rhyanon doesn't have the heart to tell her what she's truly getting into.

“Get everyone inside,” she says instead. “See that the wounded get the attention they need. I'll have food prepared. The main hall will be our command headquarters until further notice.”

“Where are you going?” Mhairi asks, as Rhyanon begins walking away.

“I have something I need to see to.”

* * * *

“Anders?” Rhyanon whispers softly, into the heavy quiet. No response. She pushes the door the rest of the way open and steps into the library. At first, she thinks he's gone off somewhere, a response that wouldn't surprise her at all given her explicit instructions not to. But then she sees him, and despite herself, the vision takes her breath away.

Her first thought is that he looks old. Ancient. He sits perched on the end of a stuffed armchair, elbows resting on his knees, head in his hands. He shifts only slightly as she approaches, and when he looks up at her, he looks dazed. “Rhyanon?” he says, so softly she has to strain to hear him.

“Yeah, Anders. It's me.” She stands there, afraid to move too suddenly, or even breathe, while he looks at her with such open conflict on his face. “It's _me_ ,” she repeats, a little more forcefully. “Anders, you can trust me.”

The last time she'd seen him, it was in a dungeon cell, when she'd freed him from Redcliffe Castle and said what she thought at the time was their final goodbye. So much has happened since then. So much has changed.

She sits down, carefully, in a straight-backed wooden chair across from Anders' armchair. “What happened?” she asks. “How did you get here?”

Anders laughs, then, bitter and without humor. But when he looks at Rhyanon, searching her face, there is a hint of life there. It fills Rhyanon with hope. “Where do you want me to start?” her old friend asks, and all Rhyanon can do is shrug.

“Wherever you want.” There are a thousand things that she should do; people who will kick in the door looking for her if she takes too long here. But none of them matter. Anders matters. “You came here for help, didn't you?”

“I... don't know. It was kind of an accident.”

He tells her, with plenty of stops and starts, about how the templars had tracked him to

Amaranthine, how they'd ended up near the Keep, and the shelter it would offer when night fell. The templars had agreed to ask for sanctuary, and they'd dragged Anders behind with them. And then, the darkspawn attacked.

He doesn't talk about what had happened to the templars she'd seen lying dead at his feet. They'd been killed by magic, though. And Rhyanon knows what templars had done to Anders. She couldn't blame him if he did kill them.

“I didn't even know you were here, Rhyanon. I mean... how could I have known?”

He looks at her like she's someone different from the best friend he used to know. Maybe she is. She's a Grey Warden now. And a lot of other things besides, not all of which Anders would find acceptable. For one thing, she's grieving the death of the man she thinks she'd loved. A templar.

“I'll keep you safe. I can do that, you know.”

He looks at her with open disbelief, and Rhyanon doesn't bother explaining everything, not yet. For now, she just needs Anders to believe her that the templars can't hurt him here. She doesn't know the specifics of what he's been through recently, but they both grew up in the Circle and can't forget it. She's watched him shut down like this dozens of times before, and each time, when he came back to himself, one of the first things he did was thank her for being his lifeline. It's a role she can continue to play. It's an easy role to fall into, when she doesn't have much of anything else left to cling to.

* * * *

A week later, the templars have still not yet come. Rhyanon has no idea how fast a message could travel alerting anyone as to what happened here, or what the response will be when that message is inevitably sent. Anders fears that whoever the Chantry sends will be able to find him using his phylactery. Rhyanon is shocked to find that she had nearly forgotten about the existence of those little vials of blood. But she has one somewhere too, another leash that pulls her back to the place she comes from.

Anders looks a little more like his old self, sitting at a bench watched over by Oghren. Both human and dwarf are shoveling their mouths full of sausages, eggs, and toast. Rhyanon plops down across from them and starts filling her own plate. Alistair had warned her that becoming a Grey Warden would change her appetite, and even after all this time, she's not quite used to how much food it takes to make her feel full. She's packing away enough at every meal to make Anders look at her quizzically.

“Mistress Amell!”

Rhyanon sighs, and just barely manages not to flinch. “What do you want, Seneschal?”

“I've gone over those assignments you requested, but, well, we really will require your aid for sealing up any darkspawn entry points. _And_ for recruiting new Wardens, come to that. But most importantly, the Queen will be arriving soon and-”

“The _Queen_?” Rhyanon splutters.

“Of course. Queen Anora is understandably concerned. She was led to believe – because _you_ led her to believe it, Mistress Amell – that the Blight in Ferelden had ended.”

“The Blight _is_ ended.”

“And yet there was a major incursion of darkspawn just days ago.”

“That wasn't a major incursion and you know it.”

“I do,” Varel concedes. “But the Queen will require reassurances.”

“Fine.” Rhyanon loathes the newly crowned Queen Anora of Ferelden – she doesn't know how else to feel about a woman who had had her imprisoned and tortured. But being a Grey Warden – in fact, leader of all Grey Wardens in the nation, at the moment – has as much to do with politics as with battle. This had never been the kind of thing she'd imagined she'd be any good at, but her education, while entirely theoretical, had been thorough. Politics is something she can figure out, if she has the time to think it through. She just doesn't _want_ to.

She dismisses Varel and turns back to the table, where Anders stares at her open-mouthed.

“ _What_?”

“You've grown up,” he says simply.

“Yeah? So've you.”

She expects him to argue the point, but he just stares at her for a long moment, and then nods.

* * * *

That afternoon, Rhyanon pushes her way through the dark passageways that lead sharply down into the tunnels and crypts beneath the Keep. They are far from comfortable, but she feels more comfortable in them than she does the twisted spiderwebs of politics that await her up above. Seneschal Varel was right – no one else can be responsible for protecting them all from the darkspawn. It has to be her.

Because there are fewer Wardens remaining after the latest attack than she can count using all of the fingers of one hand, she bolsters her scouting party with more common soldiers. After a moment's consideration, she takes Mhairi and Anders with her as well.

Anders hovers near her, casting a simple spell to light their way and chattering cheerfully as they move deeper into the tunnels. She watches him carefully, but he doesn't visibly falter. She is likely the only one who knows that his constant jokes and long-winded stories are his way of distracting himself from a deep-seated fear of the dark. She reaches out lightly with her mana, trying to get a sense of him. But she doesn't feel anything off, not really. Maybe he really is just as fine as he appears to be. She hopes so.

Then she feels it: a low pressure building more and more, spiking inside her skull: the Grey Warden sense that tells her that darkspawn are near. “Get ready,” she orders.

And just like that, they appear. It isn't a large group of them, perhaps only four or five. But they are led by one of the emissaries: the mages. Their magic feels foul and corrupt to her senses, black and slimy. This one locks its gaze onto her and Anders instantly, sensing its own kind. It clicks and chatters in the approximation of language that the darkspawn share.

And then the creatures swarm onto Rhyanon's small group. One of them lunges at her, but Mhairi jumps into the darkspawn's path, protecting Rhyanon the same way she had during the initial assault on the Keep. Rhyanon grunts her thanks, and the two of them attack together. Mhairi's swordwork is impeccable, continuous slashes that while away at even a darkspawn's resistance. The creature's black blood wells up in deep lines that trace over its grey skin. Some of it pools onto the rocky ground.

Rhyanon trusts Mhairi's effort and turns to take in the rest of the battle. While she'd been tied up by one of his lackeys, the emissary had focused its full attention on Anders. Once again, Rhyanon finds herself shocked by her friend's unexpected battle prowess. Anders blasts the darkspawn mage with a wall of ice; Rhyanon watches as snowflakes crystallize on his skin, blasting outward to encompass the darkspawn's looming form. It's a complex maneuver, requiring the caster to have enough control over their mana to let it loose in waves of power and precision both at the same time. And Anders doesn't even appear to be breaking a sweat.

The darkspawn emissary, for its part, seems to be using most of its concentration just to break free of the spell, but it is managing to do so, inching forward toward Anders one step at a time. And, as Mhairi had protected her, Rhyanon jumps forward to protect Anders. She doesn't literally throw herself between her friend and the darkspawn – not this time – but she distracts the emissary in the simplest and least subtle way possible: she throws a ball of fire directly at its head. The heat and light blossoms to life in the underground cavern and illuminates the rest of the fight. Oghren's grunts and shouts seem a little bit louder and more hearty. The rest of the soldiers attack their respective darkspawn opponents with renewed vigor. And the emissary howls with rage and pain.

Between Anders' ice and Rhyanon's fire, the emissary is eventually whittled down. After that, their scouting party mops up the rest of the darkspawn. They're exhausted, mentally and physically, and Rhyanon is nearly drained of mana. It's a long walk back to the surface, and harder work to close off the access point that will allow the darkspawn entrance to the Keep. Even then, all they manage is a makeshift barricade – a more permanent solution will take days if not weeks to construct, and materials that they do not have on hand. But they didn't lose anyone. The venture was a success.

* * * *

Four days later, after Rhyanon and the rest of the Wardens have spent much of their time sealing up every entrance to the Deep Roads they can find, the gates of Vigil's Keep are flung open wide to welcome the Queen. Anora and her retinue come sailing down the road with banners flying, their colors crisp and clear against the bright blue sky.

Rhyanon watches their approach from the ramparts, although she knows that down below, Seneschal Varel will be pacing the halls, searching for her. There will be politics, Maker help her, and rituals he'll expect her to know, and dozens of people all watching her manners and looking to her for leadership. She managed these things during the Blight. But she'd had help, then. She wasn't alone.

She nearly sinks to her knees, has to hold on to the rocky wall in front of her to keep herself standing. Even after nearly a year, there are moments like this when her grief for Alistair overwhelms her. Her breath catches in her throat and pain constricts inside her body. Mana wells up inside her, responding to her distress. And as much as she'd like to respond, and lash out at anything nearby, she forces it down.

Far below, the Queen gets nearer and nearer, appearing to grow physically larger, from Rhyanon's vantage point.

Rhyanon begins making her way down the spiraling towers toward ground level. Unlike the Queen, who is attended by at least two dozen people, most of whom are armored and carrying weapons, Rhyanon walks out alone. She is not defenseless, of course, there are soldiers and Wardens inside, and even without a weapon she can still fight. But there's no reason to call attention to that fact. The Queen will be guarded enough around her even without her flaunting her combat experience or the magic that too many already fear.

Rhyanon takes a few more long strides, until she stands just a few paces away from the Queen, who still sits atop her horse. Rhyanon bows. “Your Majesty,” she says smoothly. “You do us a great honor.”

Queen Anora appears to sneer down at Rhyanon. “This visit is not a pleasant one. But it is necessary.”

“As you say.”

There is so much bad history between them. Anora had had Rhyanon _imprisoned_ , for the Maker's sake. And then there's Alistair. His absence is a gaping wound. But it's a wound that Rhyanon can't afford to let destabilize her now. She searches Anora's face, wondering if she'll see any sign of

grief or pain there. But the Queen's political mask seems to be well and truly in place. If she's bothered at all by seeing Rhyanon again, she isn't showing any visible sign of it. Rhyanon wishes she could school her own features so well. She takes a careful breath, and plunges ahead, the best she can.

“The grooms would be happy to take care of your horse, Your Majesty.”

Anora stares at her again, for several long seconds that seem to stretch on for far longer than necessary, before she dismounts and hands the reigns to the young man who steps forward at Rhyanon's nod. He takes the beast carefully, afraid to awaken the Queen's displeasure. Anora's followers all see to their own mounts, although Rhyanon knows full well that the staff of Vigil's Keep will help with them as soon as they cross through the gate. That isn't her concern. She trusts her people. And it will take her full attention to contend with Queen Anora.

“Perhaps if you could tell me why you're here?” she begins. She keeps her voice pitched low, soft and unassuming. Queen Anora might well assume that she is weak, but the woman should know better.

The Queen gives Rhyanon a sideways glance. “This fortress holds all that remains of the Grey Wardens in Ferelden.”

“It does.”

“And yet, I have heard even in Denerim of darkspawn incursions upon this land.”

“'All that remains of the Grey Wardens in Ferelden' is hardly a large force, Your Majesty.”

“So make it larger!”

“I plan to. It's not a simple task. If you'll pardon me for saying so, this doesn't seem to be an errand that requires a queen to take it on personally.”

“What I choose to do with my time is hardly any business of yours.”

_What is she running from?_ Rhyanon wonders. What she says is “It becomes my business when it brings you to my arling.”

“You wonder if I am here to check up on you, is that it?”

Rhyanon simply shrugs. “Are you?”

“Perhaps. Though you may rest assured that it is not my primary goal.”

“What _is_ your primary goal?”

“The safety of my people.”

“Well, we share that in common, then.”

“May the Maker see it done.”

Rhyanon gives a polite nod. Anora's dismissal is implied, and Rhyanon accepts it easily, although Vigil's Keep is her territory and she feels like she should be slightly more affronted that the Queen steps into power here so easily. The truth is that she doesn't want to spend any more time than she has to in the same room with the woman.

Hours later, Seneschal Varel practically falls over himself attending to Queen Anora, seeing to it that every inch of the private dining room is perfect before serving her meal. Rhyanon sits across the table from the woman and tries not to let on how bored she is, how much she'd rather be doing almost anything else. Finally, she can bear it no longer. She has finished her plate, as daintily as possible given her ravenous Grey Warden appetite. And now, the day seems to be rapidly dying while she's trapped in here. “If you'll excuse me, Your Majesty. If you truly mean to see the people of this Keep safe, I must patrol with the other Wardens to be sure no other darkspawn approach.”

Varel's eyes grow so large that Rhyanon fears they may actually fall out of the man's head. Queen Anora, for her part, pretends not to notice. She stares at Rhyanon instead, until the mage Warden feels like a child caught doing something wrong. As though the Queen blames her personally for the existence of the darkspawn. And maybe for many other sins besides.

“Go,” Anora says, and the single word is imbued with command. Anora is a woman used to her every word being obeyed. Why shouldn't she be?

Rhyanon goes. She realizes that Varel had feared the Queen's reaction should she believe the Keep to still be under threat. But Anora had shown as much fear as she had any other emotion: none at all.

* * * *

Rhyanon does indeed patrol the grounds around the Keep's walls, keeping her eyes open for darkspawn or any other threats. She checks in with the guards along the way, but they haven't seen anything either. The quiet should be calming, but Rhyanon is determined never to be caught by surprise here again.

She turns back, under the light of a nearly full moon. She retreats toward her room, hoping as she does every night that she might be able to get some sleep, but she isn't alone in the halls of the Keep. She turns around, to find Anders following her. Conflicting emotions war inside her. They haven't talked – _really_ talked – since... before. Before she left the Circle. Before he _didn't_. The last time she'd seen him there, in Kinloch Hold, he'd just been sentenced to a year in solitary confinement.

And now he's here, standing in front of her, and it brings it all back, and she can't distract herself anymore with other things: Queen Anora's visit, or the darkspawn, or _anything_. And Anders knows it too. This isn't a confrontation, but it feels like one.

“You'd better come in,” Rhyanon says softly.

She leads him into her room, and the thing that surprises her the most is how natural it feels. They'd spent most of their childhood sleeping in the same bunkroom, and even after they'd grown old enough to be separated, first by gender and then by status, they hadn't ever fully drifted apart. So when Anders sits down next to her on the bed, without waiting for her to ask him to, she doesn't fault him for it. Instead, she turns to him. There are so many things she wants to ask. She hardly knows where to begin. What she says is “I saw those spells you cast against the darkspawn. I didn't know you could fight like that.”

Anders shrugs. “I've never had to.” He leans back against the headboard of the bed. He looks at Rhyanon for a long time, studying her. She wonders what he's looking for, if he finds it or not. “Is it true?” he finally asks.

“Is _what_ true?”

“That you're the one who stopped the Blight.”

Rhyanon nods. “Yes,” she says softly. “It's true.” But then, immediately, she's backing up. Clarifying. Downplaying her own role. “I mean, it wasn't just me. I had help. You've met Oghren. He can tell you.”

“I know. But...” he shakes his head, furiously, an attempt to ward off a nightmare. “Rhyanon, I... I met people, fleeing from the Blight. From the darkspawn. The things I saw... how could you have _fought_ them?”

“You fought them,” Rhyanon points out. He'd done it like he wasn't even scared.

“Because I had to.”

“So did I.”

Anders nods slowly, as if she's said something that makes sense. He's still staring at her as though she'll disappear at any moment. “I'm not going anywhere,” she says. Again. To hell with Anora and Seneschal Varel and anyone else that may try to tear her away from Anders. He needs her now. She needs him.

“Anders,” she says, finally deciding to point-blank ask him. “Do you _want_ to stay here?”

It takes a long time for him to reply. “I don't know.”

Rhyanon nods. It's not the answer she wanted, but it's hardly surprising. “But it's better than the Circle, isn't it?”

A flash of terror crosses his face at just the mention of the prison that had trapped them both, and Rhyanon winces, seeing it. “I can't go back there,” Anders insists. “Rhyanon, I _can't_.”

“Okay,” Rhyanon soothes, holding up her hands in a gesture of surrender, meant to calm him. “Okay,” she repeats. “No one's saying you have to.”

But he still shakes his head, wild as an animal trapped. “But the _Queen_ is here,” he whines desperately. “And the templars...”

“There aren't any templars, Anders.”

“But they're coming.”

“So if they do, we'll be ready. We'll _fight_ them.”

Those words finally seem to get through to him. He says nothing, but Rhyanon can see that he's listening, _really_ listening. He watches her still. Unsure. But willing to trust her, for Maker knows what reason. There are so many things he doesn't know about her. So many things he can't know.

She stays with him until he falls into a restless sleep, one she tries to soothe as much as she can with magic. Then she goes to try to deal with everything that she's been putting off. She knows she won't sleep tonight, anyway.

* * * *

Rhyanon had expected to find Queen Anora surrounded by a retinue of servants and sycophants, but when the Warden steps into the small study, it's to find the Queen sitting alone in a stuffed armchair, sipping at a glass of dark red wine and staring into the fire that dances cheerfully in the fireplace. She looks up as soon as Rhyanon enters the room, then beckons her inside. Rhyanon shuts the door carefully behind her and stands just inside the doorway.

“Sit down,” Queen Anora says, an invitation that comes out sounding like a command. Rhyanon hesitates, but after a moment she sits, in the empty armchair that stands a pace or so away from its twin. “Wine?” the Queen asks. Rhyanon shakes her head. “Suit yourself.” Another few moments of uncomfortable silence. Rhyanon has to work hard not to squirm in her seat. She stares around the dimly lit room, wondering if she has permission to speak. Wondering if she wants to. “I go back to Denerim soon,” Queen Anora announces.

Rhyanon nods. She'd known that already, of course. But why is this woman spending her limited time here sitting alone in the dark? “Did you find what you were looking for, coming here?” she asks.

Queen Anora looks up at her. Her eyes are slightly red, and her gaze seems a little out of focus. Rhyanon finds herself wondering just how much of that wine she's had. But her voice sounds clear enough, as she answers. “I'm still worried. But I have confidence in you.”

“I'm surprised to hear that.”

“You shouldn't be. You did stop the Blight, after all.”

_No thanks to you_ , Rhyanon wants to retort, but she doesn't. Instead, she just nods. “I will do what I can to keep the people here safe. You don't have to worry about that.”

“No. That's not what I'm worried about.”

Rhyanon frowns. “What is it, then?”

“Ferelden is tough but fragile, Warden Commander. Not unlike this little Keep. You may be able to keep the darkspawn threat contained in this area, and I hope that you can, but there will be other threats in other areas.”

It sounds like the Queen is in over her head, and Rhyanon knows how that feels. She surprises herself by sympathizing with Anora, just a little bit. She doesn't know the first thing about governing an entire nation, and she isn't at all envious of the Queen's position. Some nameless emotion – some mix of guilt and jealousy - punches her in the gut as she remembers yet again that it was Alistair who was supposed to hold the throne.

“I'm sure you'll be fine,” Rhyanon forces herself to say.

Anora smiles weakly. “It's kind of you to say so.”

More uncomfortable silence. Rhyanon decides to turn to business, if only to fill the quiet. “I've reached out to Orlais to see if they can provide more Wardens. I know that Ferelden's relationship with Orlais is... tumultuous, but...”

“But these are desperate times. Yes, of course.”

“I'm glad you agree.”

“I do not wish to be your enemy.”

“You're not.” The words come out before Rhyanon can think about them, or take them back.

“I'm glad.” Anora finishes off her wine, and sets the glass down on the low table next to her chair, beside the nearly empty bottle.

“Do you need anything else, Your Majesty?” Rhyanon asks. She has had the feeling ever since the Queen arrived that the Wardens' base of operations was under inspection. She thinks, now, that they passed whatever test Anora was here to administer, and that should make it easier to relax, but she's still holding her breath.

Queen Anora shakes her head in answer to Rhyanon's question. “No, thank you. I'm perfectly capable of looking after myself. And I'm sure you have much to do.”

Rhyanon leaves the room smoothly. She is happy to do so.

Before she even makes it halfway down the corridor that leads to the main hall, Varel has appeared, in the middle of her path. He is frowning disapprovingly.

“I didn't do anything wrong!” Rhyanon protests. “We just had a conversation.”

“She's the _Queen_.”

“And she's spending the evening drinking alone. I swear, Seneschal, she doesn't want a babysitter checking up on her. Even if it's you.”

Varel stares at her, mouth slightly agape, for several long seconds. He squints, as if trying to see through Rhyanon's story. “Very well,” he finally concedes. “If you're sure.”

“I'm sure.”

He follows her back down the corridor, unwilling to invite the Queen's anger by intruding on her solitude uninvited. Rhyanon braces herself for a lecture from the man, but he remains quiet. As they approach the main hall, he turns off toward the side room where he keeps his office. “I should go,” he announces. “There are preparations to make, for tomorrow.”

Rhyanon nods. Tomorrow will be the ceremony that initiates the new Warden recruits. She isn't looking forward to it.


	2. Chapter 2

The torches on the wall offer dim, flickering light that casts long shadows. It makes the main hall of Vigil's Keep feel both larger and smaller at the same time. Rhyanon stands in front of the assorted group of new recruits. She studies each of them in turn, keeping a serious expression on her face. She works hard not to let any nervousness show. But her uncertainty betrays her when her gaze sweeps across Anders, standing there, completely calm. He trusts her. And she's never done this before, but she knows he _shouldn't_.

She glances over her shoulder at Seneschal Varel, who waits with the heavy metal chalice that holds the mixture of lyrium and darkspawn blood so essential to this ritual. She gives him a nod, beckoning him forward. He only takes a few steps. Despite the size of the room, he doesn't need more than that, not when they are all clustered together. Rhyanon licks her lips. Anders is still staring at her. She'd told him that this could be his way out of the templars' clutches, but she hadn't had it in her to tell him the deeper truth – that it could kill him. She hadn't told him the truth about being a Grey Warden, about everything it takes from you. What else do they have left to lose?

She can't stand the thought of losing him. She wants to take the offer back. She turns away from him, instead, to approach Mhairi. Oghren and the handful of other Wardens remaining after the attack stand behind the female soldier. The dwarf offers what is perhaps supposed to be a reassuring grunt.

“Step forward,” Rhyanon says calmly. She takes the chalice from Varel and offers it to this newest recruit. Mhairi takes it with two hands, boldly. She takes a long drink.

A few long seconds pass.

A premonition of dread fills Rhyanon's consciousness, starting in the pit of her stomach and blossoming outward.

Mhairi falls to the stone floor, seizing, convulsing. Bloody spittle flecks her lips. And then, she goes still. Still and lifeless. Eyes still open. The chalice spills out from her outstretched hand. Rhyanon snatches it up.

She looks to the other recruits, who stand watching, shocked into silence.

Rhyanon swallows hard. “There is a price to becoming a Warden,” she whispers. At her Joining, there had been other words, something about the Maker's decree that some pay the price earlier than others. But those words seem unnecessary, even callous. So she doesn't say them.

She waits, for the others to argue, even to run. But no one does. One of the young men from Amaranthine simply steps forward and reaches toward the chalice. Rhyanon raises an eyebrow, but she hands it to him. He drinks, and she catches him before he falls as deep sleep claims him. But he is alive. She breathes a little easier.

Soon, Anders is the only one left. She meets his eyes, gives him the cup. He grins, and winks at her. “Bottoms up.” She smiles a little too, though fear twists itself into knots in her belly. He drinks deeply. Somehow he stays awake long enough to hand the chalice back to her – he always was a stubborn son of a bitch. She sets him down gently onto the floor.

Rhyanon sits down next to him, keeping a silent vigil over not only him, but all of the recruits who will wake up as full Wardens.

The sun is starting to shine through the windows at the far end of the room, but no one besides Rhyanon is stirring yet, when a loud commotion catches her attention. She runs out of the main hall toward the entrance to the Keep, where Seneschal Varel is trying to calm a woman in templar armor. She looks like she's just going to run right over him.

Rhyanon clears her throat and steps forward. “What do you want?” She surprises herself with how calm she is, even as the woman sneers at her. Rhyanon recognizes the templar from Kinloch Hold, though she knows little about her. She looks furious enough now, though.

The templar hasn't even opened her mouth to answer before Queen Anora squeezes her way past Rhyanon and stands next to the Seneschal, looking Rylock straight in the eye.

“You'd better answer her,” the Queen suggests, softly but firmly.

“I'm tracking down a fugitive.”

“And what makes you think you'll find that fugitive here.”

“Don't insult my intelligence.”

Varel flinches at the way the templar speaks to Queen Anora, but the Queen herself does not seem too bothered.

“I'm sure we can come to some kind of agreement,” she says, though Rhyanon is not sure of that at all. “Seneschal, would you mind if we borrowed your office for a few moments? I think it's best if we have a civil conversation rather than yelling in the hallway.”

Rylock and Rhyanon both glance at each other, but they follow Anora quietly.

The quiet doesn't last long. “Anders is a criminal!” Rylock yells, as soon as the door is closed. Her gaze slides to Rhyanon. “They both are!”

“Mind your place,” Anora snaps.

“The Chantry has jurisdiction here.”

“The Chantry did precious little to stop the Blight, Templar.”

Rhyanon raises an eyebrow and leans back against the bookshelf lining the wall. It feels shockingly familiar to hear people arguing about her like she's not even there, but unlike her time in the Circle, she doesn't feel helpless. She watches Anora and Rylock bicker back and forth, and bides her time. After several minutes, she begins to wonder if they've forgotten about her completely. Then, Rylock stares directly at her. So much for that faint hope.

“The Grey Wardens hold the Right of Conscription throughout Ferelden,” Rhyanon points out, meeting the templar's eyes.

“That doesn't mean-”

“It means exactly what Warden Amell believes it does,” Anora interrupts. “She acted in good faith.”

“I didn't think you'd agree with me,” Rhyanon says, still slightly surprised. By now she should know that she cannot easily predict Anora's actions.

“I have no quarrel with the Grey Wardens,” the Queen answers primly.

“You quarrel with the Church?” Rylock spits.

“Leave off. That's an order.”

“You have no right -”

“I am the _Queen_ of Ferelden. This is not a fight you can win.”

The templar glares at the reigning monarch, then storms out of the room. The door slams shut loudly behind her.

“You didn't have to do that,” Rhyanon points out softly.

“No. I didn't.”

“So why did you?”

“Despite what you believe, Commander Amell, I do not hate you.”

She'd said something similar the other night, while deep in her cups. Rhyanon still isn't sure how she should feel about it.

“I believe you, actually. I believe that you _use_ me.”

A smile crosses Anora's lips. “Good. Perhaps the Circle did teach you a few useful things about politics, after all. I always did see you as honest. Too much so, for much of the Blight.”

“I suppose I didn't see any gain in lying.” That wasn't entirely true, though. She'd lied about a lot of things. Kept a lot of things hidden. Some of them, Anora even knows about.

“We both want the same thing, you know.”

“You said that before. The safety and security of the people of Ferelden.”

“I have given Amaranthine to you. Was I wrong to do so?”

Rhyanon shakes her head. “No. You weren't wrong.”

* * * *

Queen Anora and her entourage have barely left Vigil's Keep before Rhyanon turns to the small band of Grey Wardens – now including Anders – that have gathered around her in the main hall. “We're going to Amaranthine,” she announces.

“Why?” Oghren grunts. Off her look, he adds, “It just seems there's more than enough work to be done here, if we want it.”

He's got a point. Rhyanon sighs. “We're going to Amaranthine because it's important for all of us to see what we're protecting. It's not about the Keep. This fortress is just the tool we're using.”

After a moment, the dwarf nods. He seems to understand.

Only one of their number – Gavin, the young soldier – actually hails from the city of Amaranthine, so Rhyanon lets him lead the group.

She lets her horse hang back a little, so that she is riding next to Anders. Her fellow mage looks much more uncomfortable on his animal than she feels on hers, but that's not surprising: the Circle hadn't found horsemanship a practical subject of study, and when the Blight began, she hadn't known how to ride well either. They're moving at a leisurely walk, nothing to stress over.

“How long do you think we'll be in the city?” Anders asks.

“Perhaps two days,” Rhyanon muses. “Certainly no more than three. Why?”

“No reason,” Anders answers. A little too quickly. Rhyanon lets it slide.

Once they enter the city, she sees a side of her friend she hasn't ever seen before, one she's imagined. The one who might take her with him when he ran away from the Circle, to show her the wide world he'd found out there. He seems younger. Happier. And she watches him with wonder, trying to see the world the way he sees it. It seems like a miracle to her, that he can just _be_ in a place like this, and not see a threat, or despair over all of the problems that it isn't possible to fix.

They leave their horses in a stable just inside the gates of the city, a place that Gavin swears will attempt to cheat them, but that their Warden insignia buys a fair price from.

“Come on!” Anders insists, taking her hand. He drags her into the market. The place is a riot of color and loud voices and a mix of languages and races. Amaranthine has an alienage, but it's smaller and less restrictive than the one Rhyanon remembers from her time in Denerim. Elves here mingle with the human shoppers and sellers, and although the Guard observes them with a critical eye, they seem able to partake in the business of the city readily enough.

There are so many possible things to see – and buy – that Rhyanon hardly knows where to look first. “Come on,” Anders says, pulling on Rhyanon's arm. She slows, as she realizes where he's taking her.

“Are these... toys?”

Anders shrugs. “I kind of like them.”

Spread out over the table of a slightly larger stall are dozens and dozens of figurines, ranging from the size of Rhyanon's thumb to the height of her hand. They are carved from wood or metal. Some are painted, in intricate detail, while others have been left plain. Some of them even have tiny gears or springs, to make them move. She picks up a tiny toy soldier, and closes it into her fist. When Anders smiles warmly, she exchanges a coin for the small souvenir, and tucks it into her pocket.

“I used to love places like this... before,” Anders says carefully.

Rhyanon nods. “I remember.” He'd brought her things, little gifts, like this one. He'd kept trinkets and treasures just like the toy soldiers, physical records of his successful escapes, hidden under his mattress in Kinloch Hold. She'd looked after them when he couldn't.

They slow down a bit, now, walking through the market without purpose. Rhyanon keeps her ears open, listening for the gossip of the city. She wants to hear what they think about the Wardens, who have made this place their base. The Blight had hit Ferelden hard, yet this far from the major stronghold of Denerim, the people's view may be different. There are the expected rumors about the recent darkspawn attacks, yet mixed with that is also other conversation – about illnesses and weather and impending weddings or the birth of children. It's the kind of normalcy that she has little basis to compare to. It reminds her, in small snatches, of the childhood she'd had in Kirkwall, which she only remembers fragments of now.

Anders seems to have a similar reaction. He has more memories of his childhood than she does, but he's kept most of them to himself. She doesn't begrudge him that right, although she treasures the few stories he had shared, in those nights in the Circle when neither of them had been able to sleep.

Anders stops at another tiny stall and trades a few coins for a bag of candy that he immediately hands to Rhyanon. She pours out a handful of the sweets and gives them back to him. As they both suck on the spun sugar, she picks her way toward a clothing stall. Unlike the armor booths she'd mostly paid attention to during the Blight, the choices on offer here are meant only to look nice, not to protect anything.

“My lady,” the proprietor announces, waving her in. “Can I interest you in a dress? This one will look beautiful, I assure you.”

Rhyanon looks down at her worn and comfortable breeches and tunic, and shrugs. She wonders if the man recognizes her. If there's even anything yet to recognize about the new Arlessa of Amaranthine.

She can feel Anders' eyes on her, and she suddenly remembers who she is, and where she comes from. That person that wears dresses is someone else, the little girl who grew up in a noble's house in Kirkwall.

When she leaves the dressmaker's stall without buying anything, Anders looks slightly disappointed. “What?” Rhyanon asks.

He shrugs. “I just thought you'd look nice, that's all.” She stares at him for several heartbeats, waiting for the smirk that would give away his teasing, or a possible lewd comment about the sight of her in a dress. But there's none of that. He really means it.

“I have dresses,” she points out. He's never seen her wear one, but they're there. It came with the package, after the Blight. When she became as much politician as warrior.

“You deserve to have something nice.”

In answer, Rhyanon reaches into her pocket and pulls out the toy soldier, placing it into Anders' waiting hand. “I've got that.”

He nods, handing it back to her after studying it for a minute. “Keep it safe,” he tells her. She nods.

She lets Anders take the lead as they meander their way through the city, though she's paying enough attention to be fully aware that they are quickly leaving the more populated center of Amaranthine behind. The market gives way to warehouses and docks; the kind of neighborhood where the rougher and poorer citizens live.

“What are we doing here, Anders?” He tries to look innocent, but she can read him too well. She knows him too well. She crosses her arms over her chest and stares him down. “You've been acting cagey ever since you found out we were coming to Amaranthine. What's going on?”

Anders doesn't answer right away. Instead, he steers her toward a narrow building that, according to the sign suspended from its roofbeams, houses a tavern. When the two of them are sitting at a table tucked into the corner, nursing drinks, he takes a deep breath, and begins to answer her question at long last. He has regained the slightly paranoid demeanor Rhyanon recognizes from the times when he feared he might be caught by templars. Does this have to do with them? Rhyanon finds herself holding her breath, waiting for Anders to talk.

“I have a... friend,” he says, and he holds up a hand to forestall the question that Rhyanon has already begun to ask. She nods, and lets him continue. “She tells me that my phylactery is here. In Amaranthine.”

“And you believe her?” Rhyanon's brow is already furrowed. She doesn't know a lot about what the Chantry does with those little vials of blood – no mage does. But why would it be _here_? What sense does that make?

Anders shrugs, but there's no disguising the hope he feels. Rhyanon knows what his phylactery means to him: there is freedom contained in that vial, beyond even that she can offer as a Warden. There's a small part of her that's even jealous, a little. If she could find hers, cut that last tie between her and the Chantry... she'd do it too, in a heartbeat. Wouldn't she?

“You want my help,” she realizes. There was a time when he wouldn't even have had to ask, but apparently he now feels that he needs to. Maybe because she's not just Rhyanon anymore. She's the leader of the Grey Wardens in Ferelden. The Hero of the Blight. The Arlessa. She's become something so much bigger than she feels like she can handle. But this, this one thing she can do. And she would do it even if it wasn't Anders asking.

She tells him so, and he grins, exhaling with relief. “Thank you, Rhyanon.”

“It's the least I can do. I mean, I kind of owe you, don't I?”

“Why?” he frowns. “Oh. You mean the Warden thing? Rhyanon, that doesn't matter. I'm fine. I don't feel any different.”

It's a lie and they both know it, but maybe there is some kernel of truth to it. Alistair had said something about rumors that the Joining affected mages differently. Rhyanon suspects it has something to do with how close they are to the Fade, how much practice they have already had when it comes to wrestling with demons.

* * * *

The address Anders had been given isn't far from the tavern where they sit. They agree to go after dark, when they are less likely to be observed. Rhyanon has planned enough battles and incursions during the Blight to feel the hairs standing up on the back of her neck. Anders is trying to project confidence, but its obvious that he's out of his depth. There is so very much that can go wrong.

And predictably, the very first thing that can go wrong, does. The warehouse is guarded, patrolled by a full squad of templars. Rhyanon looks to Anders, wondering if he's thought this through, if he's willing to kill to get what he wants. He looks determined, and Rhyanon thinks back yet again to the templar corpses that had surrounded him when she'd first stumbled across him at Vigil's Keep. He'd sworn he hadn't killed them, but does that make him innocent? Does that change what he might do, here and now?

And what about her? She's killed plenty, but it's different, somehow, with him watching. So far, she can still pretend that she's the little girl he remembers.

“Maybe we can distract them somehow,” she murmurs. Anders shakes his head.

“They'll feel us coming.”

Rhyanon has only a middling idea of how templar abilities work – even after all the time she'd spent with Alistair, she'd only learned a little bit. But she knows enough to know that Anders is right.

“We'll have to surprise them, then, as much as we can. Go in fast and hard.”

“I can do it.”

“ _We'll_ do it. You take the two on the left, I'll take the two on the right.”

“There's probably more inside.”

“Then we'll worry about them when we get inside.”

Anders nods his agreement.

And then time seems to change, the way it only does in a fight. Everything both speeds up and slows down at the same time, making it easier somehow for Rhyanon to evaluate her movements and choices. She focuses on one of the templars, standing directly in front of her, and she lets loose all of the mana she has held contained in preparation for this moment. It releases from her fingers in streams of fire that coalesce into a ball. And then she throws that ball outward, letting it crash against the chestplate of the templar's armor. The force of the blow sends him careening into the warehouse wall, hard enough to send splinters of wood flying outward. He lands awkwardly, and by the time he does, Rhyanon has drawn her sword and imbued it with yet more magical power. She slices it against his neckguard, and gets in one more cut before he draws his own sword. He's good, skilled enough to parry and block with almost laughable ease. But Rhyanon is not primarily a sword fighter, and while he's distracted by physical weapons, she turns to the weapon she is truly skilled with: primal magic. He realizes too late his mistake, and he tries to compensate for it by smiting her, but he apparently cannot summon enough concentration to make it work properly. In any case, Rhyanon retains control of her mana, and she overpowers the templar with fire and force. His body falls before she can question what she's done – or how good it makes her feel.

Anyway, there isn't time to slow down – this guard's partner does get off a mana drain, sending the searing pain of absence rippling through Rhyanon's body. She focuses on the sword in her hand, clings to it. She raises it slowly – but quickly enough – to block the second templar's incoming strike. Her head is still ringing, but she knows how to fight for her life. The templar leers at her from beneath his helmet, sending a shiver down her spine. The swordfight continues, fast and furious. This battle is a lot less one-sided than the first one, and Rhyanon actually feels afraid. It's a familiar sensation, one she's felt as recently as the day before, when she stood toe to toe with darkspawn. The trick isn't not feeling fear, but simply knowing how to use it, how to draw on it for strength. She holds her sword in a two-handed grip and charges forward, hoping the templar won't expect such outright aggression from a mage. People underestimate her more often then they should, because of her age, her gender, her looks. True to her expectation, this templar does as well. Her bullrush is enough to push him against the wall, and the hidden dagger in her left hand stabs through the gap in his armor plates at the gut, finishing him off.

She stands there, breathing heavily for a second or two, before turning to check on Anders. Another templar body lays there at his feet, and he is still fighting the last of them. He casts spells of ice and lightning, well enough that Rhyanon doesn't expect he needs the help. But she offers it all the same. Between the two of them, the templar doesn't stand any more of a chance than his fellows did.

In the quiet aftermath, Rhyanon and Anders both look at each other a little differently.

“Come on,” Rhyanon finally says. “Before we lose whatever chance we've bought here.”

She pushes open the door of the warehouse, which has nearly been knocked off its hinges in the fight. The room beyond is dark enough that she has to squint to see, at least until she calls a wisp into being, a feeble ball of light that takes more effort than it should to create, in the aftermath of the templar's earlier smite. The white-blue glow of the wisp's illumination highlights a room that looks like it hasn't been used in years. Thick layers of dust cover every available surface, and crates in various stages of disrepair litter the crowded floor. “ _This_ is a Chantry cache?” Rhyanon asks, disbelieving.

Anders, standing behind her, shakes his head sadly. “No. This is a trap.”

“And you've fallen right into it, Anders. I'd hoped you'd know better.”

“Rylock.” He sounds almost tired. And he walks toward her almost as though she's the one casting the spell. Rhyanon reaches out to grab his arm, locking her fingers around his wrist, stopping him. He looks at her with a frown of pure confusion.

“I remember you,” Rylock says, looking over Rhyanon with something like wonder. “You've grown up.”

She had been there, in the Keep with Queen Anora, but Rhyanon knows that isn't what she means.

“You don't get to have him,” she snarls.

“And _you_ don't get to decide that.”

Anders pulls his arm out of Rhyanon's grip. “Rylock, leave her alone,” he pleads. “This is between you and me.”

“You brought her here.”

Anders shrugs.

“I'm not leaving,” Rhyanon growls. She holds out a hand, showing off the sparks of firelight that flicker between her fingers.

“Just let us go,” Anders insists, forceful words coming out from behind gritted teeth. “Nobody else has to die here.”

“How can I let you go? You're a _murderer_ , Anders. Both of you are.”

“You still have my phylactery. It _was_ here, all along.”

Rylock pulls the vial out from beneath her shirt, where it hangs from a leather cord. “You're right about that part, at least.”

The sight of it banishes all sense of calm or caution from Anders. He lunges at Rylock, slamming the templar into one of the larger crates and causing her to cry out. He holds her there, with bruising force. Rhyanon lets go of the fire spell she'd been holding. She aims not at Rylock, but at the wooden crate behind her, which erupts instantly into flames. They burn and lick at the templar, roasting her in her armor, until Anders lets go of her and she runs enough to put safe distance between herself and the fire.

“What the hell do you think you're playing at?” she snarls.

“This isn't a game!” Anders yells back. “I am _never_ going back! Don't you get that?!”

Rhyanon stands there, watching the two of them scream at one another, aware that she is witnessing the surface level of some relationship she had never suspected and will never understand.

“Go ahead then,” Rylock says. “Just kill me.”

She stands there, making no move to defend herself. Rhyanon glances uncertainly at Anders.

“What makes you think I want to kill you?” Anders snaps. “The Chantry isn't worth dying for. I know you know that.”

“I can't let you go.” She keeps repeating that. So they are at an impasse, all of them watching each other, holding their breaths.

Time drags slowly. Rhyanon feels the mana building up inside of her. She looks to Anders, for permission. He says nothing, and Rhyanon refuses to wait any longer. She casts another spell, lightning this time. Rylock screams in agony. She still doesn't fight. It's unnerving.

“Rhyanon, stop!” Anders yells, after an eternity has passed.

She looks down, at the templar on the ground near her feet. Rylock isn't dead, but bloody spittle bubbles up from her lips and her breath comes in ragged gasps. Rhyanon yanks Anders' phylactery from around the templar's neck. “Come on,” she says. “Let's go.”

But Anders lingers, seemingly frozen. Rhyanon grabs his arm, but he shakes her off, hard enough that she actually stumbles.

She starts making her way out the door of the little room, but something stops her before she goes through it. She turns back, shocked to see Anders standing there with the templar's sword in his hand. There is some emotion in his eyes that Rhyanon can't quite understand, not the anger she'd expect to see, but something closer to sorrow, or regret.

As Rhyanon watches, Anders drags the sword across Rylock's throat. The templar's blood spills out onto the dusty ground.

* * * *

“They're going to come after us now. You know that, don't you?” Anders tracks Rhyanon's every subtle motion as they sit in the small study in front of a warm, crackling fire. The comforting atmosphere of the room seems like an unfair contrast to the weight of everything they've done and need to discuss. Amaranthine seems a world away; the ride back to Vigil's Keep had been long and mostly silent.

“I already told you,” Rhyanon insists. “Being a Warden-”

“ _Won't_ keep us safe. You can't believe that.”

“I want to,” she whispers softly. It has kept her safe so far, she tells herself. She clings to that knowledge, scrabbling for whatever hope she can find.

“They'll find a way to come after us. The Chantry always does.”

“And we can't keep killing them forever.” Anders sounds so much more certain in his assertion than she feels in hers. A low headache builds behind her skull. “When did we become killers?” she adds, more softly.

Anders shrugs. “You know what they did to me, Rhyanon.”

She nods. “The Wardens pretty much only have use for killers. I wish... I wish that didn't have to be what you are.”

“You're still trying to protect me? After all this time?”

“Maybe I'm just trying to get it right for once. I haven't been doing a very good job.”

“You've been doing okay.” He stands up, coming over to her so that he can gently massage the tension out of her shoulders. “Rhyanon, no one expects you to be perfect. No one ever has.”

She starts to nod, and then his lips brush against her jaw, until he's guiding her lips toward him with a free hand, and then he's kissing her. She wants to protest, but she can't quite summon up the effort it would take. It feels too good, feeling safe in his arms. And then the guilt hits her, like a punch to the gut, like a drowning wave. “Anders. I can't.”

“Why?” he asks, and he sounds just as hurt and wounded as she feels.

“I just... can't.”

For a moment, it almost seems as though he'll let it go, but then he shakes his head. “There was someone else, wasn't there?”

Rhyanon nods, sitting down again, in the too-soft armchair across from the fire. “His name was Alistair.”


	3. Chapter 3

Rhyanon had expected Anders to be angry about finding out about her relationship with a templar, but he hadn't said anything at all. The next day, when she comes down to breakfast in the main hall, he is laughing with the other Wardens as though nothing at all has happened. Rhyanon frowns in confusion but sits down at the end of the table, slightly separated from the rest of the group.

“Aw, come on, Commander,” Oghren protests. “You ain't fooling any of us. Yer one of us, and sittin' clear over there won't change that.”

Anders watches her from atop his mug, smiling slightly. “What's the plan for today?” he asks easily.

Is this what they're doing, then? Being different people around other people? Fine. She can do that too. “I want to spar with the new recruits,” Rhyanon says. “Oghren, you can help.”

The dwarf's grin is a little too eager, but she'd been expecting that, and she doesn't mind. “Sure thing, Commander,” he agrees readily.

“Eat up then,” Rhyanon says to everyone, waving her hand over the table. “You'll need all the strength you can get.”

* * * *

“I thought you wanted me to fight!” Anders protests, after Rhyanon has knocked his staff out of his hands and chided him for using magic. “This is how I fight!”

“You'll need more than spells to stay alive as a Warden, trust me.” But she softens a bit. She knows damn well that combat training hadn't been a major part of the Circle's curriculum. At least not for Anders. It had been different for her, she'd been good at it, and Irving had pushed for her to be trained as a war mage whether she'd wanted it or not.

On the ground, Anders grits his teeth, but he pushes himself to his feet and stands staring at Rhyanon, hands clenched into fists at his sides. He's got stubbornness in spades. Good. That'll help.

Anders picks up his staff again and holds it in a tight two-handed grip. “Loosen up,” Rhyanon suggests. “You have to react to where I'm going to be, not where I am.”

He tries. He relaxes his stance a bit, but he's still hyperfocused on her, almost paranoid. It makes it easy to get in under his guard. He's trying too hard. And Rhyanon realizes that she's been fighting against people who actually know how to fight, for a year now. It makes it hard to teach people who don't. She sighs. “Let's take a break.”

Anders hesitates, as though afraid that she is trying to trick him. But when she begins walking over to the small table where their gear – including skins of water – waits, he follows her. Rhyanon tosses him one of the full waterskins and takes another for herself. She leans against the wall and watches Oghren, who seems to be doing better with his group of new recruits. They fight surprisingly well, although Rhyanon realizes that most of them have had some kind of combat training. What they have to learn now is how to rely on their new Warden senses. And how to work together as a team.

Anders is watching them too, standing on the edge of the training yard. He's made progress in fitting in with them in the main hall, when they're sharing a meal and it's easy enough for him to tell the kinds of jokes that bring easy laughter. Combat is different. He and Rhyanon both are all too aware of how most people fear mages. Throwing around ice or fire seems to make that fear blossom a lot more quickly.

Rhyanon remembers how she'd felt at the beginning of the Blight. She'd maintained that separation from her disparate group of followers for weeks, until something had slowly chipped away at it. Someone. Alistair, who had a gift for bringing people together even as he swore he'd never be a leader. Hot tears pool in her eyes, and Rhyanon shakes her head, trying to clear the memories that blindside her unexpectedly in the middle of what should be ordinary moments.

“Are you alright?” Anders asks softly.

“Fine,” she lies, shrugging him off. She stalks over to the low fence ringing the combat yard. Oghren sees her, and barks an order to his recruits to call it quits for the moments.

“Like what you see, Commander?”

“They're moving too slow. And not communicating well enough. In the field, they'd be slaughtered.”

Oghren grunts, but he's smiling. He agrees with her assessment, even if he won't say so. “Guess we'll just have to take 'em out then, and see how they do.”

Rhyanon nods.

* * * *

“I don't know how I'm supposed to do... _this_ ,” Rhyanon admits.

Seneschal Varel stares at her from the other side of the large desk in the late Rendon Howe's study. “I'm not sure I know what you mean, Miss Amell.”

“I don't _want_ to be in charge of Amaranthine!”

“With all due respect, that isn't what you told the Queen.”

Rhyanon glares at Varel, knowing he is right. “I'm a fighter,” she growls. “Queen Anora gave me this assignment because I stopped the Blight, not because I'm good at paperwork.” Or making the kinds of decisions that he's asking her to make, holding people's lives in her hands. She had commanded armies, sending soldiers to die at her word, but managing an arling feels altogether different, and Varel has to know that.

But the seneschal is not easily swayed. He is remarkably stubborn too, in his own way. “You also received a well-rounded education in the Circle, or so I've been led to believe.”

Rhyanon sighs. “I... guess you're right.”

“And of course, I am here to assist you.” He says this a little more softly, for which Rhyanon is grateful. It makes it easier to believe that he truly is her ally.

“Fine. Send them in.”

By the time Rhyanon has fixed her outfit, straightened her hair, and walked from Howe's office into the adjoining small audience chamber, Varel has organized the small group of petitioners who have come seeking her assistance. The first is a farmer whose land has been ravaged by the Blight.

“My children are starving, Serah. I've run out of... well, everything.”

“I'm not unsympathetic too your problems, believe me,” Rhyanon says. But even to her own ears, she sounds too stilted, too formal. She closes her eyes for just a brief moment, and calls up the memories of what it was like traveling across most of Ferelden when the Blight was raging. Not just farms, but whole towns were trampled underfoot by the darkspawn hordes. She had met countless numbers of refugees, and if reports can be believed, hundreds or thousands of people are still fleeing the borders of this country for other lands that may be safer. Perhaps that is an idea worth proposing.

But the farmer stubbornly shakes his head when she suggests it. “I won't leave here. These lands were my father's and my grandfather's, going back generations. I may not have much, but it's more than I'd have in Orlais or the Free Marches.”

“So you're determined to stay.”

“Aye.”

“What are you looking for, exactly? Money?” There isn't enough of that for her to just go handing it out. As much as her bleeding heart may want to.

“I'll earn my keep. I'm no charity case.”

At that, Varel steps forward to whisper in Rhyanon's ear. She winces at his suggestion, but it _is_ pragmatic, despite the inherent danger. “How would you feel about becoming a Grey Warden?” she asks the farmer carefully.

His eyes widen, as though he can't quite believe what she is saying. But the reaction isn't fear, as Rhyanon had first thought. It's awe. “I... I'd be honored. And my first son would join up too, if you'd have him. Devick's been training with the City Guard, though he's not yet taken the oaths.”

Rhyanon smiles. “We'd be honored to have the both of you, then. Welcome aboard.”

The next issue brought before her actually shocks her with its brazenness. The young man in front of her was apparently caught red-handed, breaking into the Keep in an effort to burgle the property.

“Are you an absolute idiot?” Rhyanon asks softly.

The man looks up at her with piercing blue eyes hidden behind a curtain of dark hair which has been left to fall free, disguising his features. Harsh shadows projected by the bright lamps hung high up on the walls give him an even more sinister demeanor.

“You're the one squatting in my home,” the man accuses. Rhyanon looks to Varel for help. The seneschal seems to have paled.

“Master Howe.” There is no question or hesitation in his tone. Varel steps up to Rhyanon and whispers in her ear.

As the seneschal steps away, Rhyanon turns again to the criminal brought before her. “What are you doing here?” She's still speaking in the same quiet, careful tone, the pitch of her voice basically requiring this man to look at her, so she can study him, and try to gauge the truth in whatever he says.

“You killed my father, and you have the nerve to ask me that.”

“Your father was a coward and a traitor. But I didn't kill him.”

“You may as well have.”

“Your quarrel is not with me, nor with the Wardens. Though if you insist on making it so, you will lose the quarrel.”

“What is this? Some kind of mind game?”

Rhyanon shakes her head. “No game. I'm offering you a choice.”

* * * *

Unlike the previous ceremony, Nathaniel Howe's Joining is a private affair, all business. Rhyanon is the only one keeping the necessary vigil to be sure that the youngest son and last scion of the Howe family survives the night. She's been through this enough times to be relatively sure, once he's slipped into a deep sleep, that he will wake up as their newest Warden, but she stays anyway. Perhaps because she still remembers what it felt like to claw to alertness after the terrible nightmares of her first night as one of the Grey. Alistair had been by her side then, and she hadn't trusted the templar, yet his presence still seemed preferable to being alone.

She leans back against the wall, keeping her eye on the pallet where Nathaniel tosses and turns. Varel had asked if they should move him to one of the Keep's bedrooms, but Rhyanon had shaken her head. The others had spent their first night laid out on bedrolls in the main hall. This seems appropriate.

Nathaniel's hand flies out toward her, and Rhyanon wonders if that reaching out is conscious, or just a reflex. Or an accident. But she gently rests her hand atop his, letting him know that she is there, if he's aware enough to recognize it. His eyes blink groggily open, and he pulls himself up to a sitting position. He lets out a low, guttural moan. “This is the worst hangover I have _ever_ had,” he mutters. And his eyes widen and he scrambles backward, away from her, once he notices who it is sitting next to him.

Rhyanon holds up her hand in a gesture of peace. “How are you?” she asks calmly. Unlike in the courtroom, this is not a ruse to make him more inclined to listen to her; she genuinely wants to project an atmosphere of calm. They can be on the same side, if he will allow it.

“Get away from me,” Nathaniel growls.

Rhyanon keeps her distance, but she refuses to abandon him completely. “I can't do that,” she says honestly. “You're one of my soldiers. I have to know that you'll listen to me when it matters.”

He stares at her for a long moment, jaw hanging open is transparent disbelief. But then he snaps his mouth shut and gives her a dubious nod. “I'll do as you ask. Commander.”

“That's a good start. Now, answer my question. How are you? I know the dreams can be murder. Especially the first night.”

“That's what this is? Some kind of... side effect?”

Rhyanon shrugs. “It's the best explanation I've ever heard. But as you may have noticed, there aren't exactly a whole lot of Wardens around that we can ask.”

She's held the title for barely a year. But she's earned it. As much as he may hate her, Nathaniel looks at her with respect.

“Come on,” she says, starting toward the kitchen. “Let's see if we can find you something to eat. The appetite is another side effect you'll notice.”

Ten minutes later, they're sitting on bar stools at the huge wooden prep table where the cooks do most of their work. Nathaniel works at a huge leg of roast chicken, and a great deal more life seems to have flooded into him along with the food. Rhyanon relaxes a little. If she's being honest, this reminds her – almost – of stolen late nights in the Circle, with Anders or Jowan.

As Nathaniel eats, Rhyanon pours herself, and him, some weak ale, and she grabs a plate of bread and cheese and puts that in the center of the table as well. “I know you dislike me,” she starts. That's putting it mildly, but her hope is that she can build a kind of bridge between them. She learned quickly during the Blight that not everyone she'll need to work with will like her, but she also has a relatively good sense of people, and her feeling is that Nathaniel Howe does not hate her as much as he may want to. If she listens to him, lets him talk, he may give her an idea of what he's really looking for.

Rhyanon pops a small bit of cheese into her mouth and chews slowly, then swallows. “Seneschal Varel says his guards found you sneaking into the estate,” she reminds him. “What were you looking for?”

Nathaniel's brow furrows in confusion, as he searches her face, clearly looking for a trick or trap of some kind. But she's honestly curious. “This was my home. I just wanted to make sure a few things were... kept safe.”

“I won't hold you back from anything here. It belongs to you much more rightfully than it does to me.”

“I appreciate the thought, Commander. But Vigil's Keep has been given to the Wardens. I won't fight you for it. Besides, I have the feeling I'd lose.”

Rhyanon smiles. “You just might. But I'd rather have you on my side than fight against you.”

Nathaniel's face takes on a serious look, as he finishes gnawing on his chicken and sets the bone down on the plate. “Is it true, what you said? About my father being a traitor and a coward.”

Now this is dangerous territory, a place where Rhyanon knows she will have to tread carefully. “I'm sorry,” is what she finally says.

To her surprise, Nathaniel's anger seems to melt. Into what? Disappointment? “I'm... not surprised,” he admits.

“I'm even more sorry?”

Nathaniel smiles a little, bonding with her despite his better judgment. It would be easier – and more prudent – to keep her at a distance. But Rhyanon Amell is not anything like any of the commanding officers he had in the Free Marches. In just one night, she is already dissolving the barriers that exist between them. He shakes his head, then nibbles at a bit more of the cheese on the table. “My father and I didn't exactly get along.”

“So you didn't come here seeking vengeance for him?”

“I don't know. Maybe I did. But I think what I really came looking for is something more like... I don't know... my place in the world, I guess. But this house isn't mine anymore. If it ever was.”

“It can be if you want it to.”

“No way. I have no desire to be the Arl of Amaranthine. Avoiding that fate is the one good thing about getting shipped off to the Marches. Besides, you're far better at it than I ever would be.”

“How could you possibly know that?”

“Because. You didn't have me killed when you had the option.”

* * * *

Rhyanon gives Nathaniel a day to get his bearings, but even so, by mid-afternoon he's out in the training yard watching the other new Wardens spar under Oghren's direction. The dwarf is all too happy to give up the responsibility of training the new recruits to the human who can't stop yelling from the sidelines. Rhyanon and Oghren sit together on a bench against the stable wall, looking on. Rhyanon hadn't realized just how good a resource Nathaniel would be.

“He cleans up well,” she comments.

Oghren grunts. “Drink?” he asks, offering her his flask. Rhyanon takes him up on it, though she should know better. Her Warden metabolism will help her handle the dwarven brew. Oghren grins as she takes a swig. “You sure do know how to pick 'em.”

“It's an accident, believe me.”

“Yeah, I know. Otherwise, I'd never have gotten a spot on your roster.”

Rhyanon frowns. “You don't believe that, do you?”

“I dunno. I've been stuck in my own head too much, Rhyanon. I need to be out there hitting things.”

“You think that's the solution for me, don't you?”

“It couldn't hurt.”

“It very much _could_ hurt.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I do. And you know, I think you're probably right.”

* * * *

“Thought I might find you here.”

Anders looks up from the book in his lap. He settles back into the library armchair and tries to look relaxed. But he's still a little tense. Rhyanon wonders if he is, for some reason, afraid of her. “Is it okay if I come in?”

“Of course. You don't have to ask, Rhyanon.” She nods, conceding to their shared history, and steps into the room.

“What are you reading?”

Anders grins at that, and shifts a little so she can see the book. “Kids' stories. Fairy tales. The ones we used to read in the Circle, do you remember?”

“There was that stupid one about the princess trapped in the Tower who escaped because of her really long hair?”

“Yeah. That would never work.”

“I'm surprised you'd find a book like that here.”

Anders shrugs. “Yeah well, Nathaniel grew up here, right? I wonder if he's read it.”

“You could ask him.”

“Grouchy-pants? No thanks.”

“Fair enough.” Rhyanon likes to think that she's slowly begun building a bond with Nathaniel, but she knows the man's personality doesn't mesh well with everyone, and it would clash against Anders' perhaps more than anyone else. “There are rumors of a band of darkspawn ranging in the outlying farms. I'm taking everyone out tomorrow to fight them.”

“I'll get my healing kit together.”

“Anders?”

“Mmm.”

“You sound so serious. So...” she shrugs, because she can't find the words to explain what's wrong. But something is. Something's off. Back in the Circle, she would have known what it was.

“I can be serious,” Anders reminds her.

“I know, but you... aren't. Not like this. Not unless something is wrong.”

“You don't have to worry about me, Rhyanon. I promise I'm fine.”

She searches his features, but he's gotten better at concealing his lies than she is at reading them, and eventually she has to let it go. “I'll let you get back to your reading.”

He nods, watching her, to see what she'll do. To see if she'll stay. When she leaves the room, essentially because he told her to, he tries to pretend he isn't disappointed.

* * * *

Once Rhyanon has left the library, Anders leans back in his chair, running his fingers over the book that he no longer has the concentration left to read. He doesn't want to lie to her, it makes something twist up in his stomach. But the way that she looks to him... it's like when they were little. She still looks up to him. And it would destroy him – even more than he's already been destroyed – to disappoint her. He's doing an okay job of maintaining his front, taking things one day at a time – one minute at a time, sometimes. For now, he's safe enough in the library, a place he's chosen not only because it feels safe but because as far as he can tell, very few other people ever come in here. And tomorrow, they are going out to hunt darkspawn. That will distract him well enough. It will get him through one more day.

That thought – that hope he clings to – is enough to make him the first one ready and waiting to go, as dawn breaks the next morning. Rhyanon, when she joins him at the stables with a couple of the others in tow, looks at him with all-too-obvious worry on her face, but Anders shrugs off her concern. His difficulty sleeping isn't her problem. He puts a smile on his face and chooses to direct his comments toward the other Wardens, most of whom have started selecting horses and settling their gear into saddlebags. “Good morning,” Anders says pleasantly. “Who's ready to kick some darkspawn ass?”

Predictably, Nathaniel glowers at him, but Anders chooses to ignore the other man's sour disposition. “Let's go!” he says cheerily.

He's a little slower when it comes to getting up onto his horse – he's never really had occasion to learn how to ride, and he knows that he is bad at it. But the animal Rhyanon has chosen for him is docile enough. The beast is still war-trained, they are going into combat after all, but she's patient, and puts up with Anders' inadequacies without any obvious complaint.

Rhyanon surprises him by looking completely in her element. But some long-ago part of him remembers her talking about horses when she was little, when she'd first come to the Circle, before she'd forgotten that part of herself. Maybe that's what this is; maybe she is finding that part again. The idea fills him with a swelling joy, for Rhyanon at least, if not for himself. He finds joy – or tries to – in other things. The sun is making a valiant attempt to peek out from behind heavy cloud cover, and the day is rapidly growing warmer than he'd expected from its earliest hours. He sees things that make him, briefly, want to ask Rhyanon to slow down, things like wildflowers struggling to grow in the ashes of a Blight-stricken land. He wonders if she even sees them, or if she's already completely focused on the upcoming fight.

After a couple of hours of riding, he starts trying to look for signs of the darkspawn Rhyanon had been so certain they'd encounter. But all he sees is peaceful farmland. The landscape seems almost totally deserted. Every now and then, though, there is something that proves people still live here. Once, a group of children runs toward the fence surrounding the pasture where they carefully guard a few scrawny sheep, climbing up onto the wooden posts and waving and shouting at their passing heroes. Anders waves back at them, and hopes that they'll stay safe here in this contested space. The novelty of the encounter fades, though. It seems that even on the move, he can't quite keep his thoughts from encroaching, bringing darkness and fear with them, overwhelming his mind even though he'd do anything to push them away. He fights a silent battle with himself. Every now and then he looks around to see if any of the others have noticed, but it seems like they haven't. His horse doesn't even seem skittish underneath him, and he has been told that the animals can sense fear. He licks his lips, and keeps moving forward. One minute at a time.

At midday, Rhyanon stops their group in the middle of a field under a sparse stand of trees, so that they can stretch and eat and water the horses at a nearby creek. Anders stands with his horse, feeding her an apple, as he keeps an eye open for threats while listening to the others' conversation. Rhyanon is still watching him. He is still pretending to be fine. In truth, his skin his itchy, his body ready for a fight.

Thankfully, they've only been back on their mounts for half an hour or so when he feels it. The darkspawn are close, and whatever has changed inside his body that makes him a Grey Warden now makes it obvious. Their presence is like an oily slime that he can feel inside of him.

Rhyanon, who can obviously feel the approaching darkspawn just as well as he can, and has a lot more experience with it, begins issuing orders. Anders hangs in the back of the group, ready to cast long-ranged spells and standing by to act as a healer when necessary. He doesn't strictly need Rhyanon to tell him what to do, and she seems to trust him to make the best decisions for himself. But it's not just himself he needs to worry about, it's the whole group.

He's trying to get a handle on everyone's fighting styles, on who might be the most at risk. But he hasn't paid as much attention as he should in combat training, and he's only been a Grey Warden for maybe a week. And this all suddenly feels like far too much to handle all at once.

The thought has barely formed in his brain when the darkspawn are suddenly _there_ , on top of all of them. He barely remembers scrambling down from his horse. Everything after that is just reaction, pure survival instinct. The moves ingrained in him don't come from Warden training, but from something more primal than that: Circle training.

He isn't like Rhyanon, he hadn't been taught to use his magic in battle the way she had, but even still, the Circle had taught them all how to direct their mana under duress, because it's situations like this that were the most dangerous, the most likely to corrupt an untrained mage. These kinds of stresses and fears are the reason the Circles were ever created in the first place. So Anders knows how to keep his cool, how to find a calm center deep inside himself from which to make decisions that aren't entirely conscious. He taps his mana, and he reacts to the ever-shifting web of allies and enemies nearby. Ice and lightning race outward from his hands and sweep up waves of darkspawn. He listens to their howls, and the gnashing of teeth and booming of their meaty paws against shields and weapons. He listens to the yells of challenge unleashed by his companions. The clash of battle is sweaty and loud and overwhelming. A weapon swings down toward him; an axe, probably. He dodges out of the way and sends a bolt of lightning into the hulking darkspawn.

Once they are no longer surrounded, when the threat is no longer imminent, he can turn his attention to healing. He'd kept plenty of mana in reserve, knowing that this is what he'd really need to use it for. It's only then that he realizes he'd lost track of Rhyanon in the battle. How could he have let himself do that? Guilt floods him, but it doesn't last for long, it can't. Not when Oghren is waving him over, shouting and barking. “Take care of her,” the dwarf grunts.

Anders nods, picking Rhyanon up in his arms. She's dangerously still, dangerously pale. He forces himself to look up at least enough to be certain that the rest of their small group of Wardens can guard against any lingering darkspawn that may approach. And then he kneels down in the damp grass, laying Rhyanon down in front of him.

He puts his hand on her chest, above the heart, and reaches out with his mana, questing out for some sign of what's wrong. Rhyanon reacts to his mana intertwining with hers, she spasms and moans. Anders takes her hand in his free hand and gives it a gentle squeeze. “You'll be fine,” he promises. “I'm right here.”

It gets easier as he lets himself fall into the nearest thing to a healing trance that he can risk on a battlefield. He lets his mana guide him, showing him what's wrong with Rhyanon, and how to fix it. There are the expected bruises and cuts, of course, but he doesn't let himself get distracted by those. There are much more dangerous symptoms he has to quell. The fever. The sudden loss of consciousness. And, yes... there it is: poison. Expecting it, searching it out, doesn't necessarily make it any easier to deal with, but at least now that he knows what the problem is, he ought to be able to solve it. It's delicate work, though. He has to purge Rhyanon's body of the intruder that is seeking to corrupt it without damaging anything that's supposed to be there. He casts out his mana in delicate webs, ensnaring the poison and drawing it out. Bit by bit. Drop by drop. He can feel Rhyanon stabilizing underneath his careful touch, growing stronger every second. She stops shaking. Her eyes blink open. “Anders?” she murmurs.

He smiles. “Hey, there.”

Rhyanon struggles to sit up, and Anders supports her as she works to get her bearings. “What happened?” She still sounds slightly groggy.

“One of those darkspawn hit you with a poisoned blade.”

“And you healed me.”

Anders shrugs. “It's what I'm here for.”

“Thank you.”

“Don't mention it.” He helps her to her feet, and the two of them make their way over to the rest of the Wardens.

“He's a handy man to have along,” Nathaniel concedes, nodding toward Anders.

Rhyanon nods too, but doesn't elaborate. “Do we think there are any more darkspawn nearby?”  
  
“Haven't seen – or felt – any,” Oghren says. The rest of the group chimes in their agreements.

“You still need to rest,” Anders points out to Rhyanon. “We should head back to the Keep.” Rhyanon still looks reluctant, until Anders puts his hand on her shoulder. “You've done a good day's work, Commander. You've done enough.”

Rhyanon looks among all of the Wardens gathered before her, and nods. So far, she's had the biggest scare among them, and she isn't willing to risk taunting the gods by pursuing the darkspawn any further today. “Come on,” she announces. “Let's head back.”


	4. Chapter 4

“If you're here to tell me to rest, I don't want to hear it.”

“Since when have I ever lectured you?” Anders stands just outside of Rhyanon's quarters, unwilling to enter without her permission. It's not like they never shared a bedroom as kids, but they're not kids anymore, and this is a boundary that seems unwise to cross carelessly.

She's sitting cross-legged on the end of her bed, looking up at him. There are dark shadows under her eyes that make him worry – she _does_ need to get some sleep, if she's going to really recover from her earlier ordeal.

“Are you here checking up on me?”

“Can you blame me?”

Rhyanon shakes her head, and then tells him to stop standing in the doorway.

Anders enters the room cautiously, then sits down next to her, letting his legs drape over the side of the bed. Now that he's here, he isn't sure what to say. When did things get so complicated between them?

“This isn't just about the darkspawn poison, is it?”

“I promise I'm not here to lecture you.”

“I know, Anders. I know. It's just...” She takes a deep breath, then blows it out, slowly, deliberately. “It's just that, of all the people here, you're the only one who can possibly know how full of shit I am.” Anders' brow furrows with confusion, as he tries to puzzle out what she means. Rhyanon sighs, and rubs at her forehead as if warding off a headache. “You really think that I can be what they're all expecting?” she asks. “A Commander? An _Arlessa_?”

“You're doing fine from what I can see.”

“If that was true, you wouldn't look so worried.”

Anders winces. Guilty as charged. “You just need to get a little more sleep, that's all.”

“Do you really think I haven't tried?”

“Is that what this is about? You're having nightmares?”

“I'm used to nightmares, Anders. This... this is different.”

And there it is. She is vulnerable, hurt and lonely and half-broken, and looking to him for help. Anders isn't at all sure he'd have stayed here with the Wardens if it weren't for Rhyanon, but he is absolutely sure that because it is her, he has to stay.

He puts his arm around her, pulling her close the way he had when they were younger. He half expects her to pull away, but she doesn't. “Close your eyes,” he says softly. She looks at him sideways, for a moment, but she knows what he's doing, and she's willing to play along. She does as he asks.

Anders hums to himself, and to her, and then patters his fingertips down her spine, soft raindrops that come from a place where neither of them had been allowed to experience real rain. This has always worked to relax her, since she was seven years old.

“Rhyanon?”

“Mmm?”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

She tenses in his arms, at war with herself. Anders won't push. He doesn't need to, for one, and how can he judge her for keeping secrets? He has so many himself. But she surprises him by opening up, just a little. She does it in fits and starts, little hiccups of words and stories spilling out a little at a time. He'd spent a year locked up in a cell, and struggled through a little of the Blight in his last escape. But Rhyanon has been through a hell of her own, and she is beginning to break because of it.

And worse than that, far worse than the general sense of loss and pain that the Blight poured out over everyone, is Rhyanon's critical loss. Anders isn't sure he knows what it feels like to love someone, but listening to Rhyanon's voice in the quiet room, he knows how much it hurts to lose someone. The pain of it is still raw even now, her heart is still in the process of breaking. She never let it heal over. She doesn't know how.

Anders listens to the rhythm of their breathing, and he lets his eyes close as he wonders if he should return her trust in him with a little of his own, if he should tell her his own story. Or would that just be selfish? This isn't supposed to be about him. “I'm sorry,” he finally murmurs. Rhyanon looks up, her eyes widening as she shakes her head.

“I don't think anyone's ever said that to me since – Not once.”

Anders nods. He understands her point. Mages aren't usually the type of people anyone apologizes to. Shitty as that is. His fingers are still resting lightly on her spine. Her presence in his arms make him feel comfortable, and safe, and he desperately wants to give a little bit of that back to her. His heart aches as he tries to make that possible. “I don't really know how to make this better,” he admits. Some things you can't make better. Maker knows he's become well acquainted with that truth.

Rhyanon squirms a little in his arms.

There is so much under the surface for both of them. They had once been inseparable. But they've learned that the Circle can separate anyone, and it's not always so easy to come back together. No matter how much they may want to. Rhyanon is looking at Anders the same way she used to back then, taking on guilt that doesn't belong to her, feeling like everything is her fault.

“Rhyanon, there's nothing you could have done to change it. Not what happened to him, and not what happened to me, either. You know that, don't you?”

Rhyanon gives him a look that could kill, a look he recognizes all too well, from their days in the Circle. That stubborn look that somehow makes it all too clear she thinks he's an idiot. “You weren't there,” she demands.

Anders almost – _almost –_ protests. But turning this into an argument won't help anyone. “That's true,” he says softly. “I wasn't.”

*** * * ***

Eventually Anders gives Rhyanon a good chunk of his supply of sleeping potion, though he leaves her the choice of whether or not to use it. She's still holding it in her hand, looking it over, when he leaves the room. But she's still asleep the next morning when he heads down to the main hall for breakfast, or at least that's the word from Oghren, and Anders sees no reason for the dwarf to lie. He feels a little bit better knowing that Rhyanon is getting the rest she so obviously needs.

He sits down at the only free space available at the table, next to Nathaniel Howe. The man looks him up and down, and frowns. “You look terrible.”

Anders raises an eyebrow. “Thanks for noticing?” The words practically drip with sarcasm.

Nathaniel just gives a shrug and starts shoveling food into his mouth, like he doesn't care either way. He probably doesn't.

Anders reaches for a plate of his own and starts piling it high with sausage, bread, and assorted fruit. The handful of Wardens eat enough to feed a conventional army, all on their own. As he sits there, he taps his mana to make himself a bit more alert. It's not the first time he's wondered if he ought to try using the same sleeping potion he'd given Rhyanon to help himself get a bit more rest at night. Maybe tonight, he tells himself. He does so every night.

Despite his attempts to pace himself, Anders is the first to finish his meal. “I'm going outside,” he announces.

“We'll see you there,” Oghren replies.

Anders gives the dwarf a slight nod that he hopes is polite enough, and then books it out of the main hall as fast as can without actually running. It's not that the large room was particularly confining, but he still feels better out under the open sky. He wanders toward the training yard. Without any of the other Wardens out here to watch him making a fool of himself, he feels more comfortable grabbing one of the training weapons and working his way through a few forms. The swords still make him nervous, but he finds a staff that feels solid and reassuring in his hands. The heavy wood gives him something to push against, and, even better, the straw dummies in the middle of the field give him something to fight.

He imagines those formless shapes as templars, and as darkspawn, and he whirls his staff against the nearest one's head. Straw flies off in all directions after a satisfying thwack, and Anders grins. He hits the dummy, again and again and again, until he is soaked with sweat and breathing hard.

“A dummy won't hit back,” Rhyanon points out, when Anders has stopped to take a drink of water. He whirls around, to see her watching him from the other side of the low fence that rings the yard.

“I thought you were asleep.”

“I was. I'm not now. But thank you for the magic elixir. It did help.”

“I'm glad.”

“There's no shame in using it, you know.”

Anders shrugs. He knows Rhyanon wouldn't look down on him for having nightmares, but he's gotten used to having to deal with things on his own. “I'm thinking about it,” he tells her honestly.

Rhyanon shrugs too. She won't pressure him either way, and they both know it. But she's worried about him. She can't hide it. She never could.

“Do you want to spar?” she asks, nodding toward the training field.

Anders smiles. “Sure. Those dummies have probably had all they can take anyway.”

Rhyanon nods, and the two of them step out onto the field.

“Do you still not want to let me fight with magic?” Anders asks.

Rhyanon looks at him for a long moment, turning the idea over in her mind. But then she shakes her head. “No. I want you to fight however you fight best.”

Anders nods.

The two of them had never really gone up against each other in the Circle, not even for practice. Rhyanon is surprised by how difficult a fight it is. She supposes she shouldn't be, having seen what Anders can do against the darkspawn.

She can feel the pressure of his mana clashing against hers, even before he shapes it into the kinds of primal spells that can cause real damage. Lightning crackles out from his palm, forming a ball the size of a closed fist that flies toward her face. She ducks, just in time, and comes up breathing heavily. In retaliation, she launches a ball of fire. There is a part of her that is afraid that she might accidentally hurt him, but his quick reflexes keep him safe enough. At least they do until the moment she throws a crackling ball of ice and hits him straight in the chest. The cold spell crashes against the ill-fitting armor Anders is wearing, but he still goes down.

Rhyanon runs to him, falling to her knees so that she can check on him. “Are you all right?”

Anders groans, struggling to sit up. But he manages, with her help. “Ow,” he complains.

“What were you thinking?”

“Nothing. It was just an accident, right, Rhyanon? I'm fine, I swear.”

“You're not fine,” Rhyanon demands. She'd seen him, just before the ice spell hit. He'd looked like he was blacking out or something.

Anders looks at her and seems to know that he'd been caught hiding... whatever it is he's hiding. Rhyanon has always been perceptive. She knows him too well for him to be able to hide anything from her. So he just takes a deep breath and looks her in the eye. Without realizing it, he's curled up the same way he had on his bunk in Kinloch Hold, when he'd been trying to avoid talking to her about solitary. It's the same situation now. But they're both outside in the sunlight, on a pleasantly warm day. Birds are chirping. He takes another deep breath and holds onto that. What he knows. What he can see. He lets the breath out slowly.

“You're right,” he says to Rhyanon. “I'm not fine.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

He shrugs. He genuinely doesn't know. If he could solve his own dysfunctions, he wouldn't be in the mess he's in now. He tells her that.

“Anders, this isn't your fault,” is Rhyanon's reply. It's a lot less accusatory than a lot of what she'd said when they were in the Circle together. But she's been bruised and battered quite a bit herself, since then. And he still loves her anyway.

Anders squeezes his eyes shut as soon as the thought crosses his mind. He can't admit to that out loud, can he? He's not supposed to love her. He's known her since she was a little kid, she is his closest friend. And neither of them have ever wanted anything more than that. Right?

She'd asked him, earlier, if he wanted to stay. Of course he does. He'll do anything to be able to stay by her side. He may be broken, but it's the kind of broken that's better with her around.

* * * *

“Anders. Talk to me. Please.”

Anders doesn't ever have trouble talking to _anyone_. But he hasn't said a word to her all morning, even though this trip to Amaranthine was his idea.

“Anders? Are you alright?”

For a long moment, he says nothing, and Rhyanon is sure that he will continue ignoring her. But then he stops. The horse nickers softly in the quiet, and Anders shakes his head. “I can't sleep. I can't... nothing feels right to me, Rhyanon. Nothing feels like anything, no matter how much I try.”

“What are you talking about?” Rhyanon speaks so softly that at first she isn't even sure Anders will be able to hear her. Her voice falters as she tries to force the words out. Because she _knows_ what he's talking about. She feels it too. She just never expected that Anders would understand. He has been taking such good care of her that she'd almost forgotten all the very good reasons she has to be worried about him.

“Rhyanon,” Anders says, as he slips off his horse and holds his hand out to her. “Come on.”

She follows his lead, and the two of them wind up sitting together in a fallow field, nowhere near the city. Anders wraps his arm around her. “I've been waiting for things to get better,” he admits. “But they haven't. It feels like they're only getting worse, and that doesn't make any sense.”

“Anders, you know I'm here for you.”

“I know. And that just makes me feel worse.”

“But you invited me out here on this... what _is_ this?”

“I don't know. I just wanted to talk to you. I wanted to... to try to make things work.”

“And when you say 'make things work,' what exactly are you talking about?”

“I don't know, Rhyanon. I just want things to be like they were.”

“Like they were _when_?”

“I don't know. When we were kids. Before everything fell apart.”

“Anders, everything was always broken.” She doesn't understand what he wants. Is he actually talking about the Circle like it was something good? Whatever he's remembering, it isn't the same as what she remembers, clearly.

“Maybe you're right. Come on. Let's just go back to Vigil's Keep.”

“What? No! Come on, I want to go to Amaranthine with you, Anders.”

“You do?”

“Yes. Maybe... maybe we can make things be like they were.”

“Or like we wanted them to be,” Anders murmurs. Rhyanon nods. That sounds a lot more plausible, anyway.

“It can't be that hard,” she insists. “I ended the Blight. Everyone said that was impossible. We should be able to figure out how to make things... not broken.”

“It seems like a good goal.”

He moves to get back on his horse, but before he can mount up, Rhyanon grabs his hand. “Anders, wait.” She stands on tiptoe, and kisses him. It's tentative and awkward, but Anders doesn't pull away. And when Rhyanon breaks off, he is smiling. He waits until Rhyanon climbs onto her own horse before he follows suit.

They don't reach Amaranthine until late afternoon, but Anders is actually okay with that. The imminent sunset adds to his plan for a romantic, perfect day, or as close to one as he can create. The warmth from Rhyanon's earlier kiss still lingers, and boosts his mood. He puts his hands in hers as soon as they stable the horses, and the two of them walk slowly through the crowded streets of the city as the sky's colors change from blues to pinks and oranges as the sun goes down. Anders guides Rhyanon to a restaurant on the waterfront. It's the kind of place neither of them can afford, except that Anders has never worried about money, always relying on his charm to get by. And Rhyanon is famous.

“Warden Commander!” the proprietor squeaks. “Please, come in. You do me a great honor.”

Rhyanon smiles shyly. Even this many months after the Blight, she isn't used to being seen as a hero.

The short man with his beaming smile leads her and Anders to a table with a view of the boats tied to the docks. “You will have the house special!” he announces.

Anders smiles. “That'll be fine.”

Half an hour later, he and Rhyanon are dining on pasta and seafood, and it is exquisite. “You're smiling,” he points out, watching Rhyanon.

“This is nice,” she agrees. “Thank you, Anders.”

“You're welcome.”

Rhyanon winds up asking the restaurant owner if he can recommend a good place for them to stay the night. The man smiles knowingly, but he seems all too happy to give her the name of an inn only a few blocks away. When Rhyanon pushes open the door to the room, a large bed greets her.

“I'll sleep on the floor,” Anders offers.

“Don't be silly. There's plenty of room for both of us.”

Anders nods. But he sleeps in his clothes. He doesn't want to make any assumptions or do anything wrong. He cares about Rhyanon too much for that.

She too sleeps fully dressed, but it is still the most comfortable sleep she's had in months. At least it starts that way. Rather than stay awake, tossing and turning and frustratingly unable to drift into slumber, she feels relaxed and calm with Anders next to her. Her eyes slip closed, her breathing slows, and then she's out. The rest she gets is sorely needed. But far before the sun comes up the next morning, her eyes snap open again. She rolls over, keenly aware even before she does so that she is not the only one awake.

“Anders?” she murmurs. “Are you alright?”

He boosts himself up on his elbow so he can get a better look at her. “Better now,” he says.

Rhyanon nods in understanding. “Bad dreams?”

“How can you do this every night?”

Rhyanon lets out a heavy sigh. He's right. It's not really something you can get used to. “There's not really another choice, is there?”

“No. I guess not.” He reaches out, tentatively, and tucks her hair behind her ear. “I meant it. It really is better with you here. I missed you so much when... when you were gone.” He falters slightly, but they both know what he means. She was gone. He was locked up. This past year has been hell for both of them.

Anders sits up, jiggling his leg up and down, looking over his shoulder at Rhyanon. She's used to this kind of behavior from him, this need for motion. “Why don't we go for a walk?” she says.

Her suggestion of movement seems to make Anders realize his edginess. He stills, and stares at her. Then he rubs his face with his hand, and nods. “Okay,” he says, a little hesitantly. But Rhyanon takes his acceptance as a sign of enthusiasm, and she smiles. By the time they've reached the first floor of the inn, they are walking hand in hand. Once they've made it onto the streets, which are bustling with workers headed for their day's labor, the nervousness he'd displayed indoors is gone completely, replaced by a boyish cheerfulness. He practically runs ahead of Rhyanon in his eagerness to get to the waterfront. He scrambles up onto the pier, turning back to Rhyanon, who is walking at a far more leisurely pace. He takes her hand and helps her up onto the rickety wooden posts of the dock, and holds her close so that she can see the sunrise.

The colors tinting the sky are truly beautiful: pinks and oranges and reds that lighten into morning. There is a natural sense of magic in it that makes him feel refreshed in a way that feels more sustainable and true than even a night's unbroken sleep. From the tiny smile visible on Rhyanon's face, she feels the same way. But she remains silent. Distant. She lets Anders hold her, but her body is tense.

“What's wrong?” he asks quietly. Rhyanon shakes her head. “Don't say 'nothing,'” Anders insists, before she can do exactly that.

Rhyanon takes a long time before she answers the question. When she speaks, it's with halting starts and stops. “I just was remembering... the last time I saw a sunrise like this... I mean, really saw it.”

“It was with him, wasn't it?”

“Alistair. Yes. He used to sit with me early in the mornings, before we had to break camp or go anywhere. Before we had to fight. Anders, he had this... this _gift_ for finding beautiful things.”

“Like you,” Anders murmurs. The words slip out before he can stop them. Once they're out, he doesn't want to take them back. “He found beautiful things like you,” he confirms.

“Anders...”

“It's okay. It's not... I'm not... asking for anything. I just wanted you to know. After all this time. After everything, you deserve to know.”

“Was that what this was all about?” Rhyanon demands. Her voice is soft, but there is a hard edge to it that makes it obvious that it _is_ a demand. “You brought me into the city to... what? To tell me you love me?”

“I didn't mean to, Rhyanon, I just... it just _happened_.” But just because it wasn't planned doesn't mean it isn't true. He had spent so many days alone when the thought of her was the only thing that kept him going. Kept him sane. She's been a lifeline for him since the day they first met. “I'm sorry,” he pleads. “Forget I said anything.”

Rhyanon sighs heavily. “This isn't the kind of thing I can forget,” she points out. But rather than push him away the way Anders is expecting, she takes his hand, and looks up into his eyes. “Anders, listen to me.” She won't let him look away, won't let him break the contact between them. He nods his understanding. And he listens. “You're right. There's too... too _much_ between us. There's too much _us_ to forget. I'm not sure what that means yet. But I'm willing to try to find out. If you are.”

Anders nods desperately. “Of course I am, Rhyanon.” There is an aching emptiness inside of him that only she is able to fill. Of course he's willing to try.

He hugs Rhyanon close to him, wraps his arms around her, and this time she lets him. After several long moments, he breaks off the hug. They walk hand in hand down the narrow pathways on the edge of the docks, listening as the sailors shout over the wind. A string of paper lanterns hanging overhead between two balconies overlooking an alleyway guides them away from the waterfront and deeper into the city. At the other end of the alleyway, the streets widen into a market square. Anders grins, pulling Rhyanon into the carefully controlled chaos of shoppers and sellers hawking their wares. Small children run through the crowds, and musicians perch at the street corners playing their instruments and nodding toward hats or cups at their feet, hoping for coins from the people passing by. Rhyanon stands in the middle of it all, trying to get a feel for the city that she is now suddenly in charge of and responsible for.

“They're happy,” she tells Anders, and it seems for the most part to be true. This isn't a city like Denerim, heavy with the weight of war and the fear of the Blight. Amaranthine's relative prosperity seems untouched, and though there are whispers of darkspawn out in the farms and fields, within the city itself no one seems to know that they ought to be afraid. Rhyanon wonders if they'd listen to her if she told them what dangers lurk outside the walls.

“Good,” Anders says, in response to her comment. He squeezes her hand, willing her to be happy too, even if just for a moment.

* * * *

“What happened?” Nathaniel asks, as Rhyanon hands her horse off to the groom at Vigil's Keep's stables. She turns to her second-in-command.

“What are you talking about?”

Nathaniel waves a hand, flourishing it to take in her head and body, all of her. “You look different,” he insists.

“Nothing happened.”

Anders comes up behind the two of them, having taken a bit longer to take care of his horse. Nathaniel's jaw drops a little when he sees the other man. “I should've known,” he mutters.

“Nothing happened,” Rhyanon repeats, although she knows that Nathaniel will believe what he believes and there will be no convincing him that he's wrong.

Anders steps up next to her, and takes her hand. Rhyanon could pull away, if she really wanted to put to rest the rumors that will certainly be spreading soon among the Wardens – even Varel seems to look at her differently. But it feels too good to walk side by side with Anders again. She doesn't let go of his hand.

There are a thousand things that she is supposed to do, as Commander of the Grey. Even Anders isn't enough to get her to back down from her obligations. They fill her time and her thoughts in a way that Anders' presence alone can't do. So she gets back to them, diving in with her full self.

Anders sits on the edge of her desk as she deals with ledgers and paperwork. Rhyanon knows Anders is smart, despite his tendency when they were young to blow off his schoolwork. “You can help me with this, you know.” He smiles at her, but after a moment, he nods. He's willing. Maybe just because it's her that's asking.

Both of them lean over the desk, as Rhyanon reads dozens of requests and lists and missives

needing her attention, her brow furrowed in concentration. A jolt of something like electricity shoots up her spine as Anders' thumb brushes over her hand. She looks up, meeting his caramel-colored eyes.

“What do you want?” she asks him. She barely lifts her voice above the level of a whisper. She's prepared for him to ask a question about the books and documents spread out in front of them, or even for him to complain about being hungry; she's ready for him to tease her or offer a joke. But he doesn't do any of that. Instead, he leans in a little closer to her, and kisses her, slowly and deeply, until she's hungering for more and she reaches out to draw him in a little closer.

They are both truly breathless by the time the kiss breaks, and after they have taken a few desperate gulps of air, Rhyanon kisses Anders again. He smiles, she can feels the upward quirking of his lips, and then their mouths are open and they are tasting one another, pulling one another close.

“Rhyanon,” Anders murmurs, the next time they stop to breathe. She nods, urging him to continue saying whatever he needs to say. “Can we take a break?”

“Maker, yes.”

They practically run up to her quarters.

* * * *

The next morning, Nathaniel doesn't even say anything, he just raises an eyebrow as Rhyanon sits across from him at the breakfast table. Anders is sitting next to her, so close that their bodies are practically entwined. Rhyanon throws a rolled up napkin at Nathaniel, and further down the table, Oghren laughs knowingly. “Good for you, Sparklefingers.”

“Shut up, the lot of you,” Rhyanon protests. But she is grinning. She is happy. Anders makes her happy. The knowledge doesn't come without its shadow, of course. Feeling happy at all – and especially with Anders – feels like an unforgivable betrayal of Alistair. Her grief at his absence sweeps over her, causing her stomach to knot painfully and tears to threaten to spill from her eyes. She ducks her head and grabs a roll from the bread basket on the table, stuffing it into her mouth. She chews mechanically, knowing that her body needs nutrition despite the pain that guilt has ignited deep inside.

“Are you alright?” Anders asks quietly. Rhyanon nods, unwilling to deal with the questions he will certainly ask.

And anyway, she has to be alright, so she will be.


	5. Chapter 5

Anders goes to Chantry services every morning, but that has never been Rhyanon's style. Still, during the Blight, with Alistair... he had truly believed in the Maker, with the kind of uncomplicated faith that made her want to believe in it too. People like Alistair and Anders find something good in the Chantry, something that makes them feel better. And Rhyanon is so damned desperate to feel better that she is willing to try even this.

Anders shoots her a questioning look as she slides onto the rough wooden bench directly behind him, but she doesn't give him a response. Anyway, after the service is over she can tell him that she's there because her presence is probably expected by the dozens of commoners who crowd the small worship space. There are plenty of things about being an Arlessa that she doesn't know; whether they are required to give praise to the Maker in public is just one of them.

She knows what to do in this place, anyway. It was ingrained in her in all of her years of life in the Circle Tower. She has vague memories of the same motions, the same words, in the time before that. She kneels on the hard floor and listens as the Revered Mother asks for the Maker's mercy to grant them all forgiveness for her sins. Rhyanon figures she doesn't deserve forgiveness, but she mouths the words of the prayer anyway.

She sits to listen to the sermon, and the words of the Chant. They sound familiar but she can't seem to grasp their meaning. What is she doing here? The service wraps up with a call-and-response; Rhyanon understands the words but doesn't participate. Why did she think that this would do anything? What made her think that this would make her feel anything but empty?

She watches the commoners spill out of the small church first, keeps a smile plastered on her face and directs it toward the old ladies and gruff men who have come here from their farmsteads because she offered them a future. More than one of them shakes her hand and thanks her for her service. Rhyanon waits for them all to go. When she turns back, Anders is standing in the same pew where he'd been since she came in, watching her, one eyebrow raised in question.

She still doesn't answer him – she doesn't know what to say. Instead, she watches as the Revered Mother gathers up the bowls and table linens used in the service and disappears through a back door. Now that she and Anders are alone in here, something in Rhyanon seems to collapse. She sits down on the bench. Anders sits down next to her.

“I didn't think I'd ever see you in here,” he points out. Rhyanon shrugs.

“Thought I'd give it a shot.”

“If I knew what you were looking for, I might be able to help you find it.”

“Is that what you're doing when you come here? Looking for something?”

“Maybe,” Anders admits.

“What are you doing?”

Anders continues massaging the tension out of Rhyanon's neck and shoulders. “Trying to get you to calm down. And maybe even talk to me.”

“Okay,” Rhyanon agrees. “But can we maybe go somewhere else?”

Anders hesitates only for a moment, then he takes her hand and leads her out of the church and up toward the roof of the Keep. Both of them have always appreciated the sense of freedom they feel in high up places, a throwback to their days of climbing up to the top rooms of the Tower whenever they could sneak away from the templars.

They stand up there on the roof, looking down at the patchwork fields spread out below them. “I don't get you, Rhyanon. It's like... like you're afraid of doing something wrong by being with me.”

“I _am_ afraid of doing something wrong?”

“ _Why_?”

“Because,” she says simply. Just because. Because of Alistair. And because of Anders too.

Anders kisses Rhyanon, not so desperately as the day before. This kiss is quick, and gentle, and he is inviting her to offer more, but she doesn't. She just stares out at the faraway horizon.

“I'm sorry, Anders,” she whispers. “I'm not sure if this is a good idea.”

“Oh. Okay, then.”

He sounds so sad, so lost and lonely, that Rhyanon almost takes it back, and tells him she doesn't mean it. She stays silent, though, even as Anders disappears back into the Keep.

* * * *

The next day, Oghren and Nathaniel sit down on either side of her and won't let her get away without answering their questions. “What _happened_?” Nathaniel hisses. Oghren wordlessly offers her a drink. Rhyanon just wants to know how they know that anything happened at all.

“Anders came down here before the sun was even fully up and took a plate to his room. What did you do to him?”

“You were happy enough with him,” Oghren points out. “Did he do something to you?”

“No. I just-”

“You're wallowing in guilt over things that aren't your fault is 'just' what you're doing. Come on, Commander.” Oghren stands up, still chewing on a stick of sausage.

“Where are we going?” Rhyanon asks, after following him for a few steps.

“We're going to fight until you come to your senses.”

The sparring match does feel good, Rhyanon has to admit.

She's exhausted and covered in sweat, dirt, and bruises by the time it's finished, and breathing hard. She wipes away the sweat falling into her eyes and watches as Nathaniel puts away the training weapons and heads back toward the Keep.

“You coming?” he asks, before Rhyanon can even begin to wonder if she's supposed to follow him. She nods, and lets her footsteps fall into place behind his.

Nathaniel leads her to the kitchen, where he starts rummaging around for enough food to sustain the both of them. Rhyanon watches as he loads a plate with sausages, cheese, bread, and after a moment, a couple of small apples. Rather than head for the large hall where they normally eat, Nathaniel finds a couple of stools and places them next to the large table where the kitchen staff normally work to prepare the Keep's meals. None of the kitchen staff are in here at the moment, a coincidence that Rhyanon finds a little too convenient. But she sits next to Nathaniel and eats the food that's placed in front of her.

“Anders and I used to sneak into the kitchens in the Circle,” she remembers aloud. Nate smiles.

“He makes you happy,” he points out.

“He makes things complicated.”

“Complicated doesn't have to mean bad, you know.”

“I know. Like I said, it's... complicated.”

Nathaniel raises an eyebrow and settles back in his seat. He crosses his arms over his chest. He waits for her to continue. But Rhyanon doesn't know what else to say.

“Look, Commander. I barely know either of you, but I've had a bit of experience with pushing people away and regretting it afterward. He makes you happy. That's not nothing.”

“I know,” Rhyanon says softly.

Nathaniel takes another bit of cheese from the plate, and then he leaves her alone with her thoughts.

* * * *

Rhyanon barely sleeps that night. More than once, she considers going after Anders, to apologize, to do whatever she has to do to make things right between them, but she never acts on that impulse. Instead, she spends the long hours wallowing in self-pity, just as Oghren had accused her of doing. About an hour before sunrise, she gets up and splashes her face with cold water before pulling on fresh clothes and heading out into the chilly morning.

After a moment of deliberation, she veers off toward the stables. The horses snicker and whinny at her approach, and Rhyanon greets each of them before finding her chocolate-colored stallion in the very last stall. She leads him out toward the gate, then climbs up into the saddle as the guards let her through. They send her off with sharp salutes, and Rhyanon only looks back once before the gates are closed again. She feels strangely vulnerable without any of the other Wardens with her. It's not that she's afraid; she knows she can handle herself. It's just been a long time since she's been out on her own. And too much time alone with her own thoughts is never beneficial, these days.

She spurs her horse from a walk to a trot, then to a canter. They eat up the miles of road in quick strides, and the trees to either side pass by in what looks like a blur. Rhyanon doesn't have a destination in mind, and for once, she's not even out looking specifically for darkspawn. It feels good just to ride. At least, she's grasping desperately for anything that might feel good, and this comes close.

Later, when they have gotten far enough away from the Keep that Rhyanon can barely see it on the horizon far behind her, she stops to let her horse drink from a small stream. She slides off the animal's back, and digs through her pack for a bit of bread and cheese for herself. The sunlight has changed from dim pre-dawn to the bright clarity of mid-morning. Rhyanon has taken only a few steps, munching on her snack, when she hears something that sounds like a scream. Immediately, her heartbeat starts to race, and she calls mana to her fingertips as she heads for the source of the sound. A few more running steps take her into a clearing, where an elven woman stands surrounded by dead and dying humans, a half dozen of them. She looks up at Rhyanon, and she is smiling. Rhyanon tries to suppress the chill of dread she feels.

“What are you doing here, human? These woods are mine.”

“You killed these people,” Rhyanon says, and she doesn't bother keeping the anger from her voice.

“And have you come seeking vengeance?”

Rhyanon blinks. The mana buzzing through her makes her whole body tremble, but she keeps a lid on it. For now. Barely. She looks into the elf's crazed eyes, and she shakes her head. “That isn't why I'm here.”

“My actions here are just,” the elf demands. “These humans killed my clan.”

Surprisingly, Rhyanon does not immediately dispute the claim. “Can you prove that?” she asks. Slowly, she lets her mana bleed away with every breath, dissipating harmlessly into the air. She is ready to call it to the surface again if she needs to.

“What proof do you require? Is my word not enough?”

“I don't even know you.”

“And I do not know you.”

“I'm a Grey Warden,” Rhyanon says, waving toward the griffon insignia that has recently been affixed to her armor. The elf's eyes just furrow in confusion. “We hunt darkspawn,” Rhyanon adds. There is still nothing on the other woman's face but blank non-comprehension. “Monsters. You know?” She holds up a hand to symbolize the approximate height of a darkspawn, and tries to contort her face into one of the creature's snarling growls.

“The only monsters I have seen in these woods are the humans.”

Rhyanon sighs heavily. She is not just a Grey Warden, after all, she is also the Arlessa of these lands, and she can't just let a murderer go free. But does she really intend to arrest someone who, from all apparent evidence, has just killed six people single-handedly? “I can't just let you go,” Rhyanon says.

The crazed grin comes back to the elven woman's face. “How do you propose to stop me?”

“You can't just _kill_ people.”

The elf doesn't respond. She just goes on with her day as though Rhyanon wasn't standing there watching her. She begins rifling through the pockets of the dead men, but she doesn't pick up any of the coins or weapons that are there for the taking. She takes nothing, after a quick and efficient search that clearly doesn't turn up what she wants it to.

“What are you looking for?” Rhyanon asks.

“My sister,” the woman answers.

“She isn't dead?” The question is blunt, but Rhyanon doesn't feel the need to indulge in niceties here. She still isn't entirely certain that this woman won't kill her, despite the fact that she has made no threats thus far.

“She was taken.”

“Taken,” Rhyanon repeats.

“None of these men that I have hunted claim any knowledge of her.”

“And were you there, when she was taken? Did you see it happen?”

The elf shakes her head. “But I am a good tracker, human, and I will find her.”

“What if I can help you do that? Will you stop killing people?”

“You would help me?”

“If you promise to stop killing people, yeah.”

“I so swear,” the elf says, after several long moments. Rhyanon lets out a breath.

“Come on, then,” she says. She begins walking back toward the stream where her horse is waiting. She's several paces away from the clearing before she realizes that the elf isn't following her. She turns back. The elf is still standing in the clearing, stubbornly still.

“These woods are mine. Why should I go with you, human?”

“Because you need my help. Don't you?” After several seconds at an impasse, Rhyanon adds. “Nothing's going to happen to you, I swear. You'll be under my protection.”

The elf actually _growls_ at that, at the thought that she might need a human's protection, but this time, she follows Rhyanon.

She refuses to get on the horse, but Rhyanon keeps Cocoa to a walk, and the elf keeps up easily enough. She slows when they approach the Keep, and scowls when she sees the guards in their uniforms. Those same guards return her suspicion in their glances, but when they look to Rhyanon for confirmation, she just nods. So they open the gate and let the elf through along with their Commander.

Rhyanon brings her guest through to Varel's study, and she closes the door behind them to ensure privacy in the quiet space. “What's your name?” she asks. It surprises her that she hadn't thought to ask until now.

“I am called Velanna.”

“I'm Rhyanon.” The mood in the little room is awkward, but Rhyanon does what she can to lighten it. “Are you hungry?” she asks. When Velanna doesn't answer, she sticks her head out into the hall and asks a passing servant to bring food anyway. She smiles when Velanna eats some of it, hesitantly, but every step forward represents some small bit of progress. “You're not a prisoner here,” Rhyanon insists.

“So I can leave?”

“I won't stop you. But if you do, you might never find what you're looking for.”

Velanna swallows the last of the food from the plate, and glares at Rhyanon. But she understands, and she nods her agreement of the arrangement.

Rhyanon stands up and guides Velanna into the hall, then takes her upstairs to an empty bedroom where she can stay. Velanna pushes her way past Rhyanon and looks around the room. It's impossible to tell if she is pleased by the accommodations, but she stays put inside of them, not even coming down to dinner even when she's invited.

The next morning, Rhyanon knocks on the bedroom door, half-expecting to find the room empty. But Velanna is standing there looking for all the world like she'd expected Rhyanon to come.

“You can fight,” Rhyanon says. It isn't a question. She had seen firsthand the evidence of that the day before. Velanna nods, slowly. “Good,” Rhyanon says. “There's something you should hear.”

This time, when she beckons, Velanna does follow. The two of them make their way down to the first floor of the Keep. Rhyanon stops quickly in the main hall so that Velanna can get something to eat, and then she brings her into Varel's study once again.

This time, they are not the only ones in the room. A grizzled older man wearing armor sits in one of the chairs. “Tell her what you told me,” Rhyanon says.

The man takes a wide-eyed look at Velanna, but after one quick glance at Rhyanon, he nods and begins talking. He describes seeing a band of darkspawn stealing away an elven woman near the Kingsroad about a week prior.

“Where were you, when this happened?” Velanna spits. “Why did you not stop them?”

“By myself?” the man growls. “Are you crazy, woman? I came to ask the Wardens for help. These darkspawn have taken half a dozen women over as many days. My men and I have fought them where we can, but stop them...” He shakes his head. “No, we aren't capable of that.”

“We'll find them,” Rhyanon promises, although she is not at all sure if that is a promise she can keep. “We'd welcome your help,” she tells the old soldier. The man nods and promises that he and the rest of his mercenary company will join them on their hunt.

Velanna looks ready to leave immediately, but Rhyanon holds her back. “We need a plan,” she insists. “We can't go running off half-cocked.”

“I could go,” the old man offered. “My men and I, we could scout ahead. Come back and tell you where to look.”

“Will you let her go with you?” Rhyanon asks, nodding toward Velanna.

The man doesn't look pleased about it, but he finally nods. “Aye. I'll do that.”

* * * *

“I want you to let me into the Wardens,” Velanna demands, the next afternoon, when she has returned to Vigil's Keep with the rest of the mercenary band trailing behind her.

“You have no idea what you're asking,” Rhyanon insists.

“I will pay any price to find my sister.”

“So you didn't find her, then.” Rhyanon is surprised by how disappointed the news makes her. She hadn't honestly expected positive results, but if there are darkspawn out there kidnapping people, it seems to fall under things that are her responsibility.

“The men say that you Wardens can find darkspawn when no regular human stands a chance.”

Rhyanon nods slowly. “If that's what you really want,” she finally says.

That night, she mixes the lyrium and darkspawn blood in its ceremonial chalice and presents it to Velanna. The elven woman sniffs at the concoction, but she drinks it down without complaint. Rhyanon holds her breath as Velanna collapses, but she is still breathing, still alive. She thrashes in her sleep, riding out the nightmares as Rhyanon keeps silent watch.

The next morning, Velanna wakes up to find Rhyanon still keeping an eye on her.

“How do you feel?” Rhyanon asks.

“Hungry,” Velanna responds. Rhyanon smiles.

* * * *

“I thought I might find you here.”

Anders looks up from the book in his lap. His left hand is gently petting a cat, who meows as Rhyanon steps closer. She sits down in a nearby chair and wonders if there's anything she can do to make this feel less awkward. Sunlight streams in through the small window above their heads.

“What are you doing here, Rhyanon?”

“We need to figure this out.”

“This?”

“Us.”

Anders stares at her for a long moment. “I didn't think there was an 'us,'” he finally says. “You said it wasn't a good idea.”

“It _isn't_. But Anders, we can't just pretend that there's nothing between us. We're not complete strangers. I don't want that.” She stops suddenly, taking in a deep breath. “Do you?”

“No. Of course I don't want that.” He wants so much more than that, it's killing him. But Rhyanon keeps pushing him away. “What _do_ you want?” he asks her. He tries not to sound as desperate as he feels.

“I don't know.” When it comes to him, she never has known. She has always been afraid to get attached.

Before he realizes what he's doing, Anders has put his hand on top of hers, slowly massaging her fingers. She relaxes into the touch, which makes him feel a little more confident.

“You're scared,” he murmurs. Rhyanon nods. It's then that he realizes she's crying.

“Hey,” he says softly. He reaches up to brush the tears away. “Hey, what's wrong?” He presses a kiss to her forehead.

“I can't do this, Anders,” Rhyanon protests through hiccuping cries. “I can't just pretend like nothing happened, like everything is the same as it was. I can't forget about Alistair.”

Alistair. That's what this comes down to. Anders hopes the hurt he feels isn't obvious on his face. “I understand,” he says simply, although in practical terms, he doesn't. He has never had what Rhyanon had with Alistair. He's never been so close to someone that he'd feel broken when they were gone. Except, maybe, with Rhyanon.

“Anders, I'm sorry.”

He shrugs. “Don't be sorry.”

“I don't want to push you away.”

“Rhyanon, I already said it's okay.”

Rhyanon nods. The two of them just sit there for a long while, trying to get comfortable with one another again. Guilt threatens to swallow Rhyanon whole and she tries to lose herself in Anders' presence, but it doesn't entirely work. He sits there with his arm wrapped around her and she wonders if this feels half as complicated for him as it does for her. There are so many layers of right and wrong here that she can't even parse them all out. Finally, she takes a deep breath. It's only a little bit unsteady. Anders turns to her, suddenly alert, as soon as she does so. “There's something I need to tell you,” Rhyanon admits.

Anders nods, waiting with a held breath for her to continue, to say what she needs to say. Rhyanon drums her fingers up and down on her leg. This kind of restlessness isn't how she usually behaves, but to Anders the need for motion is familiar. He reaches out to gently trap Rhyanon's wrist with a loose grasp. “Rhyanon,” he says simply, looking her in the eye. She keeps trying to break away from his gaze, but she can't quite get there.

“I'm a blood mage,” she says simply. The admission spills out into the open, and Rhyanon nearly flinches as she awaits Anders' reaction. She keeps expecting him to pull away. How can he still want to touch her, now?

But he's still there. And he's surprisingly calm. He pulls her into a tighter hug, leaving her feeling more confused than ever. She tries to pull away, and he lets her, but though the open door is only a few steps away, Rhyanon stays in the room. Anders keeps her there. She owes him an explanation, at the very least. In truth, she owes him a lot more than that.

“Did you... did you hear me?” she ventures cautiously, when he still has not responded. Anders heaves a heavy sigh, and then he nods. Of course he heard her. But then why isn't he saying anything? “Anders?”

“I already know, Rhyanon.”

“How?” Rhyanon asks, looking to him for some hint of reaction. How is he still so _calm_?

“I've seen the marks, Rhyanon, I'm not an idiot.”

“But you never said anything.”

“What was I supposed to say?”

“I don't know. I just thought...” She trails off. “I just didn't want you to be angry at me.”

“I'm not angry.”

“What are you?”

He shrugs. “I don't know. Disappointed, maybe? Confused.”

Rhyanon holds herself tense, desperate for his approval and afraid of his reaction, but still too proud to let him tell her off. Confused? What the hell is that supposed to mean? He wasn't there, he wasn't there for any of it. He didn't see the choices she had to make during the Blight. Even now, she isn't sure that she can say she made the wrong ones.

She looks down at her arm, where the scars Anders mentioned are clearly visible against her pale skin. Anders hates blood magic. She's always known that, it's why she's always been afraid to tell him. He's always viewed it as an easy way out. A sickening guilt swirls in the pit of her stomach as she wonders if maybe he is right.

She tells herself that people would have died without the mana she'd pulled from her own blood – always her own, surely that makes it different. She's not the monster he thinks. Without that blood, that easy source of mana, she would have died. She's never told him about that night in Kinloch Hold when she almost let herself lose everything. But if the voice in her head that night had been a demon, it's one she's still grateful to, even now.

She sometimes wishes she hadn't had to make the choices that she did, but she wouldn't unmake them. She is supremely confident in that knowledge, more so now than ever as she looks at Anders, who sits across from her with a soft frown on his face and brows wrinkled in concern.

“I know what I'm doing, Anders,” she insists.

“Rhyanon, it's _blood magic_.”

“It's not like I do it all the time!”

“You shouldn't do it at all!”

“You sound like a templar!” She regrets the words as soon as they come out of her mouth, and Anders looks visibly stung. “Anders, I'm sorry,” she adds, more softly. She tries to reach out to him, but he won't let her. “I didn't mean it,” she keeps babbling. “I'm an idiot.”

“You're not an idiot. I'm just... I'm worried about you.” He has always worried about her. There's always been something in her, some deep-seated fear that he has never been able to quell, no matter how hard he's tried. She has never believed that she is good enough, no matter what anyone says to her, no matter what she does. There is a hole inside of her, and he desperately fears the consequences if she is trying to fill that hole with blood magic.

But he doesn't see her as a monster – he can't – even though that means rethinking everything he thought he knew about the kind of person that engages in blood magic. “Rhyanon, I love you,” he blurts out.

“I know.” Is she crying? He thinks there are tears in her eyes. He reaches out to wipe them away, and Rhyanon just falls into her arms, and the tears spill over onto his shirt, and he lets them. “This isn't how I thought this conversation would go,” she admits, through her sobs.

Anders hugs her, and plants a kiss on the top of her head. “You can't scare me away that easily,” he tells her. They've been through too much together for him to let her go now. He gives her arm a gentle squeeze. “I'm just glad you told me the truth.”

* * * *

They walk down to dinner hand in hand. Nathaniel and Oghren give each other knowing smiles, and Rhyanon sits just a little bit away from Anders, trying to maintain her independence in the face of the rumors that have already started to fly.

But after dinner, Anders follows her, still smiling, and she doesn't have it in her to turn him away. She doesn't _want_ to push him away. She tried that once, and it just felt _wrong_ , at gut level. At heart level.

“I'm just going to a meeting with Varel,” she says, as Anders falls into step behind her.

“Are you saying I can't come?”

“You can't come.”

“Fine.” Anders shoves his hands into his pockets and glares as she enters the small office where Varel sits perched behind the oak desk that takes up nearly the entire room, waiting for her. Rhyanon spends the entire meeting testy and twitchy, essentially letting Varel make all the decisions, trusting him maybe more than she ought to, or maybe it's simply not trusting herself. She keeps thinking about Anders, and how much she'd rather be spending this time with him.

Varel always seems slightly distracted to Rhyanon, like he's simply got too much going on in his head to be able to focus well on any one particular thing, even if it's the thing in front of him. But even Varel can't help but notice that Rhyanon isn't paying attention either. He gives her a disapproving frown.

“Mistress Amell-”

“Commander.”

“Very well, then. Commander. If you don't authorize the fortifications for the Keep, we won't be able to hold against a darkspawn attack.”

Questions swirl through Rhyanon's mind, so fast that she can't actually ask any of them, which is just as well since most of them are stupid. Finally, she says “Do we have enough money to do this? Everything you're asking?”

“Not yet,” Varel says.

Rhyanon raises an eyebrow. “Not _yet_. Where's it supposed to come from.”

“Well, you, of course. Given your status as arlessa, you could raise taxes...”

“Great. Like the people here don't hate me enough.” But she holds up a hand to forestall Varel's protests. “I'll do it, Varel. We have to do it.” The alternative is a darkspawn invasion like the one she had stumbled into when she first arrived here. She won't let that happen again, especially not now that the Keep and the land around it are full of refugees. “We'll start with the walls.”

Varel nods, looking all too happy to agree.

* * * *

Rhyanon nearly trips over Anders as she leaves Varel's office. He is sprawled out in front of the door, although he hastily moves his legs out of the way as the office door opens and Rhyanon walks out.

He glances into the room, probably attempting to catch a glimpse of Varel, but Rhyanon closes the door quickly and stares down at him.

“You didn't have to wait for me.” She wasn't expecting him to, certainly. Anders shrugs and runs a casual hand through the hair that is falling into his face.

“What else was I going to do?”

Rhyanon holds out a hand to help him up. Anders takes it, and leverages himself to his feet.

“How late is it?” Rhyanon asks. She'd lost track of time in her meeting with Varel, but it feels like she must have been in there for hours.

“Late,” Anders confirms.

“I probably ought to go to bed.”

“Probably.”

He walks her to her room, stands there lingering at the doorway. Every second seems to pass by incredibly slowly. Rhyanon keeps waiting for him to turn away. “Don't go,” she finally says. Anders smiles.

They sit at the foot of the bed, exploring each other with tentative touches. Rhyanon moans softly as Anders' hand traces up the curve of her neck. She puts her hands on his hips, leaning in as he kisses her, slowly. She breathes in the heat of him, gasping as his lips crush hers. He pulls back, looking into her eyes for several long seconds, giving her time to protest or pull away or tell him that this isn't a good idea. But she doesn't. Every move he makes, she matches.

He pushes her down onto the bed, and straddles her, and she closes her eyes and licks her lips and Maker, she wants this, so bad. She wants him. She has always wanted him.

“Anders,” she murmurs, and he stops, immediately, but she traps his wrist with her hand. “Don't stop,” she tells him.

“Okay,” he agrees, sounding just as breathless as she feels. They slow down. But they don't stop. Anders pulls his shirt over his head and tosses it to the ground. He reaches out to grab at the hem of Rhyanon's shirt. She feels suddenly shy, but she lets him pull the garment off. Then she pushes up onto her knees, and kisses him. Slowly. Deeply. Tasting him, like lemons and lyrium, and she can feel the mana pulsing just underneath his skin. Anders rests his hand on her back, just above her breast band. His free hand is bracing himself on the bed, for now, but Rhyanon puts her hand atop it. She looks into his eyes, and nods. Anders grins, and he picks up his hand and brushes a strand of hair out of her face before moving down to her pants and helping her to wiggle out of them. Rhyanon shivers in the chill of the room, but then Anders is on top of her once more and she forgets all about being cold. More kisses, trailing across her forehead, down her neck, some of them pressed onto her lips. Anders knows what he's doing. He's strong, and confident, and Rhyanon almost laughs at how easy this is. They have been making it complicated for years, but now that they're here, it feels like the only possible thing. Anders kicks his trousers off, leaving both of them naked or nearly so. Rhyanon can feel his erection pressed up against the inside of her leg. She shifts a little, guiding him into her. Anders sighs in happy relief, as Rhyanon begins grinding her body against his, her movement accelerating the friction between them. They find their rhythm, Anders thrusting, and Rhyanon gasping and crying out with each exhaled breath. Finally Anders finishes, and he rolls onto his back, soaked with sweat, a huge grin on his face. Rhyanon continues breathing heavily, and she flops down next to him. She barely manages to pull the blanket up to cover them both before they fall asleep.


End file.
